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Book •_ 

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ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

ITS PROBLEMS AND PROCESSES 



BY 

JOHN ALEXANDER HULL KEITH, A. M., 

PROFESSOR OF PEDAGOGY AND ASSISTANT IN PSYCHOLOGY, 
NORTHERN ILLINOIS STATE NORMAL SCHOOL 



CHICAGO 

SCOTT, FORESMAN AND COMPANY 

1905 



y' 



0.5 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

NOV 17 1905 

-, Copyright Entry _ 

CLASS CX- XXc, No, 

/ 3 I 3 ?f 

COPY B. 



COPYRIGHT, 1905 
BY 

SCOTT, FORESMAN AND COMPANY 



YPOGRAPHY — PRESSWORK— BINDING 
ROBERT O. LAW COMPANY 

CHICAGO, I LU 



PREFACE. 

This book is a resulPof -experience with, and study of, 
various aspects of elementary education. Out of this experience 
and study has grown the conclusion that efficiency in teaching is 
the outcome of persistent effort based on progressive insight into 
the nature of the processes involved. Except as regards the 
purely mechanical aspects of schoolroom management, mere 
experience in teaching is fruitless. 

One element in the growth of the teacher is an understand- 
ing of the aim and meaning of education as a concrete social 
process. Such an understanding paves the way for an intelli- 
gent and profitable study of the materials and method of educa- 
tion. (Chapters II.-V.) 

A second element in the growth of the teacher is a realization 
of the fact that in the concrete processes of discipline and of the 
recitation, if anywhere, the aim of education is to be progres- 
sively realized. This insight makes profitable a study of dis- 
cipline and of the recitation in their relations to the aim, ma- 
terials, and method of education. The insight thus gained also 
enables the teacher to appreciate the important relations which 
exist between thought and expression. (Chapters VI.-X.) 

A third element of growth is a comprehension of the nature 
of the successive stages of the child's mental development, the ^' 
demands made upon the materials of education and upon the 
method of teaching by these stages, and the relation of interest 
and attention to every aspect of elementary education. (Chap- 
ters XL -XIII.) 

These elements do not necessarily come, as matters of in- 
dividual attainment, in the order just sketched, nor does a 



4 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

teacher gain complete insight regarding one and then another. 
Indeed, a teacher may be efficient without having consciously 
formulated them at all. All growth, however, is a unified and 
progressive process. 

The materials needful for growth in insight and in efficiency 
abound in every schoolroom. What teachers need to do is to 
think about the perspective of their work, and thus discover its 
significance. There are no "petty details" to the one who 
works intelligently, for he comprehends the relations of the 
things taught and done to life. 

The purpose of a book on elementary education ought, 
therefore, to be to stimulate its readers to think. In order 
to bring about this result, the processes and problems which 
confront the teacher must be the material out of which the book 
is wrought. The treatment of this material should be of a 
character to invite the reader to form independent judgments. 

This book, accordingly, has chapters on the Aim, Meaning, 
Materials, and Method of Education; on Discipline, The Reci- 
tation, The Relation of Thought to Expression; Stages of Knowl- 
edge and Stages of Instruction, The Preparation of the Teacher; 
and a summary of the theses which underlie the arguments and 
conclusions of the book. 

The distinctive features of this book are: its dealing with 
the concrete processes and problems with which every teacher 
is familiar; its working from this material, by analysis, descrip- 
tion, and argument, to educational principles; its introduction, 
in simple and concrete form and in connection with the dis- 
cussions, of those fundamental psychological truths which are 
at the basis of all valid learning and of all successful method; 
and its emphasis upon the social view of education. 

The book, therefore, should appeal to those who are teach- 
ing in elementary schools, in either city or country, and to those 
who are preparing to teach in such schools. 

In common with all students of psychology, sociology, and 
education, I am indebted to the writings of Comenius, Herbart, 



PREFACE 5 

Spencer, Giddings, Ward, Leslie Stephen, William James, J. 
Mark Baldwin, and John Dewey. 

There is another indebtedness — almost personal — to men 
who as teachers have been to me as "stimuli to unrest''; C. A. 
McMurry, David Felmley, George P. Baker, Josiah Royce, 
Hugo Miinsterberg, Paul H. Hanus, William James, and John 
W. Cook. 

My personal thanks are due to Miss Ida M. Simonson, who 
has intelligently and sympathetically criticised the composition, 
and to President David Felmley, who has made many helpful 
suggestions regarding the book itself. 

John Alexander Hull Keith. 
DeKalb, Illinois. 
August, 1905. 



CONTENTS. 



Preface. 3 

CHAPTER I. 

Introductory: — 11 

Education a matter of universal concern. — Described in various 
ways. — Education as a social function. — The fundamental 
problem of the school. — A medley solution of this problem. 
— The teacher should be an artist. — A conduct-influencing 
knowledge of psychology is necessary to the highest effi- 
ciency of the teacher. — Motor knowledge of psychology. — 
Motor knowledge of the aims of education. — The character 
of a helpful book. 

CHAPTER II. 

The Aim of Education, and the School as a Social Effort to 
Realize It. 
| 1. The aim of education is always the same as the con- 
scious aim of society. 10 
$ 2. The aim as a formal, static thing. 21 
$ 3. The aim as a spiritual, dynamic thing. 22 
\ 4. The aim as adequate participation in the actual social 

life of the race, and in the ideals of the race. 24 

I 5. How participation is possible : — 26 

(a) As regards the natural environment. 26 

(6) As regards the m3ntal life of one's fellows. 2S 

(c) As regards institutional life. 29 

$ 6. The organization of schools is a social function. 30 

§ 7. The real social character of the public school. 32 

CHAPTER III. 

The Meaning of Education as Determined by Its Aim. 
$ 8. Education as a process of organizing acquired habits 

of conduct and tendencies to behavior. 33 



CONTENTS 7 

I 9. Education as a process of grafting socially serviceable 
reactions upon, and thereby supplanting, natural tend- 
encies. 35 
$10. Education as a process of widening the gap between 

impression and expression by inhibition. 36 

$ 11. Education as a process of world-building. 37 

| 12. Education as a process of other ing. 38 

£ 13. Education as a process of removing the tension between 

the ideal and the real. 39 

\ 14. Education as a process of becoming socialized by par- 
ticipation in the actual and ideal life of the race. 40 

CHAPTER IV. 

The Materials of Education, or the Things that may be Used 
in Realizing the Aim of Education. 

\ 15. An analysis of elementary school subjects to show 

their implicit social reference. 44 

| 16. An analysis of the materials of education as Institu- 
tions, Industries, Sciences, and Arts — together with 
their social references. 52 

g 17. The materials of education as equipping one to func- 
tion effectively as subject to (a) natural laws, (b) insti- 
tutional laws, (c) ethical laws, and (d) spiritual laws. 56 

\ 18. The materials of education may be described as includ- 
ing all that enables one to make an honorable living by 
serving others helpfully, and all that enables one to live 
honorably. ■ 57 

§ 19. Knowledge, character, and culture should be inte- 
grated phases of the educative process, and these ele- 
ments should come from the use of any of the educative 
materials. 59 

CHAPTER V. 

Method in Education, or the Re-creation by the Child of 

His Race Inheritance. 

\ 20. Involuntary experience, or mental activity resulting 

from involuntary movement. 64 

I 21. Conscious imitation. 69 

| 22. Discovery. 71 

§ 23. Invention. 74 

I 24. Self -activity. 75 



I CONTENTS 

§25. An examination of other terms used in describing 

the method of education. 76 

g 26. The formal steps. 81 
g 27. Methods of teaching as correlative with methods of 

learning. 84 
CHAPTER VI. 
Discipline, Including School Organization and Management. 

§ 28. Introduction to problems of discipline. 86 

| 29. Stages of selfhood in developing children. 94 

\ 30. Organization and management: — 102 

I. Mechanical phases. 102 

II. Spiritual phases : — 104 

A. The course of study. 104 

B. The personal influence of the teacher. 107 

C. Co-operation in various forms. 110 

D. Decoration of schoolroom and school grounds. Ill 

CHAPTER VII. 

Discipline, Including School Organization and Management 
(concluded) 

III. The social relationships involved : — 115 

A. Legal relationships. 115 

B. Extra-legal relationships. 117 

IV. The conduct phases : — 119 

A. What should the conduct of pupils be? 120 

B. The prevalent school offenses. 121 

C. Offenses as springing from causes and from 
motives. 122 

D. Inhibition by negation and by substitution. 124 

E. Kinds of punishment and their relation to the 
child's sense of self. 127 

I 31. Conclusions regarding discipline. 131 

CHAPTER VIII. 
The Recitation. 

| 32. What the recitation now is. 134 

I 33. What it is to teach. 135 
\ 34. The relation of reactive behavior to learning and to 

teaching. 138 
\ 35. The means at the disposal of the teacher for securing 

reactive behavior. 146 



CONTENTS 9 

§ 36. The nature of the command and of the polite request. 147 
\ 37. The nature of the suggestion. 150 

CHAPTER IX. 
The Recitation (concluded). 

\ 38. The nature and kinds of the question: — ■ 151 

1. On the basis of form. 152 

2. On the basis of the teacher's purpose. 156 

3. On the basis of the kind of thinking demanded to 
answer the questions. 162 

I 39. The assignment of work. 179 -v 
| 40. What pupils should be expected to do in their study 

of assignments. 182 * 
\ 41. The relation of the recitation to the study previously 

done by the pupils. 182 

\ 42. The relation of the problem to teaching. 183 

CHAPTER X. 

Realism and Symbolism in School Work, or the Relation of 

Thought to Expression. 

\ 43. What is meant by realism and by symbolism in 

teaching? 184 

I 44. The formative influence of motor attitude. 186 

§ 45. The character of conventionalized symbols. 187 

\ 46. The influence of realism on methods. 191 . 

\ 47. The values of conventionalized symbols to teaching. 193 
\ 48. Conclusion on the formative influence of motor 

activity. 197 

CHAPTER XI. 

Stages of Knowledge and Stages of Instruction. 

\ 49. Analysis of knowledge into image and concept stages. 201 
$ 50. Sub-stages of image thinking: — 204 

A. Wonder and name-getting. 204 

B. Make-believe and fancy. 205 

C. Dramatization, games, and imitation of social 
activities. 206 

D. Individual achievement, distinction, and invention. 221 

E. Causal thinking from sense contact. 224 



10 CONTEXTS ' 

CHAPTER XII. 

Stages of Knowledge and Stages of Instruction (concluded). 

$ 51. Sub-stages of concept thinking: — 228 

A. Concept forming, classification, and definition. 228 

B. Judgment forming and opinion-making. 230 

C. Causal thinking and the formation of personal 
attitudes. 239 

D. Logical thinking and systematization. 242 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Class Interest and Attention. 

\ 52. Introductory and descriptive. 253 
\ 53. The relation of attention to the formation of the self. 257 

| 54. What class interest depends upon. 259 

| 55. What class attention depends upon. 261 

$ 56. Participation the real secret of class interest and 

attention. 263 

\ 57. The formation of habits of attention. 264 

\ 58. The development of permanent lines of interest. 266 

CHAPTER XIV. 
The Professional Preparation of the Teacher. 
2 59. The teacher should understand social life in its historic- 
aspects, present forms, and ideal tendencies. 268 
\ 60. The teacher should understand the physical, intel- 
lectual, emotional, and volitional development of the 
child. 270 
$ 61. The teacher should, by practice under guidance, be- 
come skilled in the details of utilizing the materials of 
education to bring about the maximum social develop- 
ment in the child. 272 
I 62. The teacher should approach his task with a full 
consciousness of its significance, and with a desire to 
serve "that others may have life and 'have it more 
abundantly." 275 
CHAPTER XV. 
A Discussion of the Summarized Theses upon Which the 
Arguments and Conclusions of this Book are Based. 



CHAPTER I. 

Introductory. 

Education, in one aspect or another, touches every human 
interest, and is the most universal concern of mankind. It is 
a process described in almost as many ways as there are persons 
who consider it. An engineer once said to William Hawley 
Smith: "An educated man is a man who is onto his job." 
From this engineer's point of view, education is a process of be- 
coming proficient in doing one's work, in performing skillfully 
those things which it is his business to perform. From this 
point of view, a skillful ditch-digger is an educated man; and, 
from any point of view, he is educated as a ditch-digger. This 
means, if he be not educated in other ways, that his view of life 
is limited and narrow. 

Education is the most universal concern of mankind be- 
cause (1) it touches and relates to every phase of human activity, 
and (2) it is a process which continues in time from the cradle 
to the grave. A man who paints crude buildings, mixes and 
spreads his paint with skill which he has acquired through edu- 
cation. The performer of a thrilling acrobatic feat has learned 
to do it by and through his education. Skill in doing things 
always means that one has been educated. Whenever human 
activity becomes purposed (that is, ceases to be random, reflex, 
and instinctive) we find conclusive evidence of education. More- 
over, for any individual, the process of education extends through- 
out his life. In extreme old age one may acquire relatively few 
new thoughts; but as the grandmother sits knitting, memory 
keeps time to the click of the needles and the former events of 
life are brought into relation with the present and thus given a 
new significance. As long as one's control over things in- 



12 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

creases, as long as one is not wholly a creature of habit, one is 
learning, and, by virtue of his learning, is being educated. 

Manifestly such a universal process may be considered in 
many ways. And even when, by analysis, we attempt to con- 
sider only the essential elements of the process, we find educa- 
tion such a complex thing that no one description or definition 
is adequate. One says that education is a process of othering, 
meaning thereby that every experience by which one becomes 
other than he was before, is educative, and that the sum of such 
othering experiences constitutes one's education. 1 Another says 
that education is a process of world-building, meaning thereby 
that the mental processes by which man constructs for himself 
a realm of related and systematized conscious activities, con- 
stitute one's education. 2 Still another says that education is 
the removal of the tension between the real and the ideal, and by 
it means that education is the process by which mind becomes 
progressively organized through attaining, on the basis of what 
it is, its possibilities. 3 

But when a community, or "society," consciously under- 
takes, through the organization of a school system, the syste- 
matic education of its youth, there is implied in this fact an aim 
which society desires to realize through this process. This aim 
is not the same as the process, for the community, or "social 
group," desires that the process shall have a certain result; not 
merely othering, but othering in certain definite directions; not 
merely building a world, but building an acceptable and worthy 
world; not simply removing the tension between the ideal and 
the real, but removing the tension between worthy ideals and 
the real. Society thus sets up educational aims and establishes 
schools for the realization of them. 

The person or persons in charge of these socially organized 
schools have, therefore, the problem of how best to realize edu- 
cational aims by and through the organization and conduct of 

1 Dr. John W. Cook. 

2 Davidson, in Educational Review, Vol. XX. p. 325 ff. ; Nov. 1900. 

3 Tompkins' Philosophy of Teaching, pp. 73-108, especially pp. 102-103. 



INTRODUCTORY 13 

the school. This single problem readily separates into two 
problems, viz., What materials are most effective in realizing 
these aims? and, What methods of teaching are most efficient? 
In general terms, experience is deciding what the best materials 
and methods are. To state this more in detail, the studies of 
existing social needs, of the materials suited to the different 
stages of development of children, and of the ways in which the 
minds of children act and grow, are the sources of our varying 
answers to this fundamental problem of the school. 

There are those who believe that this fundamental problem 
should be sub-divided and parceled out for solution. For ex- 
ample, let ethics set up the end of education; let psychology 
ascertain the laws of mental action and growth; let the specialist 
in art or in science or in geography or in history decide what por- 
tions of these subjects children should learn; and when all this 
has been done, let the teacher take the conclusions of ethics as 
fundamental principles, the laws of psychology as definite 
descriptions of how the mind grows, and the course of study 
as a static, fixed, unchanging compilation. The teacher thus 
becomes an executive, a task master, a schoolmaster. And, 
really, if the aim of the school be only the acquisition of so 
much knowledge and skill in certain ways, this executive-teacher 
plan is an excellent one. But if the aim of the school be a higher 
thing, if it be the formation of socially efficient moral individ- 
uals by and through the process of education, then the teacher 
should be an artist, not merely an artisan. 

To be an artist-teacher demands that one be able to act 
intelligently with respect to all the complex aspects and elements 
of education. The teacher must, on the side of the material of 
education, have more than a mere knowledge of the facts of 
geography, of history, of nature, of whatever may be taught. 
This additional thing, with respect to the material of education, 
is insight; is an appreciation of the worth of the facts and prin- 
ciples to human life — for only in this way can the teacher solve 



1-i ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the problem of the relative values of the things that might be 
taught. 

Moreover, no secondhand ethical code will be satisfactory 
to the artist-teacher; for unless one's ethical code has been con- 
sciously worked out it can have no enthusiasm and, hence, no 
inspiration for others. And, finally, the artist-teacher's knowl- 
edge of how the mind of the child works must be a knowledge 
born of experience, and not of verbal repetition. It is easy to 
learn a definition of apperception, but difficult to teach in such 
a way that each child in the class apperceives thoroughly. It is 
easy to understand that association by contiguity has little of 
meaning about it, but it is far from easy so to teach that associa- 
tion by similarity is stimulated. Psychology is so comprehen- 
sive a subject that one may study it for years and not know to 
what extent it is serviceable to teachers. 

From the analysis and arguments just given several things 
should be evident: 

r I. MOTOR KNOWLEDGE OF PSYCHOLOGY. 

No teacher can reach his highest efficiency without a con- 
duct-influencing knowledge of psychology. It is not meant 
that a knowledge of books on psychology will increase one's 
teaching efficiency, nor is it meant that even a knowledge of the 
reality called mind or of mental processes will insure this effi- 
ciency. But just to the extent to which one's actual or concrete 
teaching activity is made to harmonize with the reality of the 
child's developing mind, just to that extent is a knowledge of 
psychology serviceable in increasing one's teaching efficiency. 
The study of books on psychology may or may not be service- 
able to teachers. To be of any genuine service, the ideas thus 
acquired by the teacher must find expression in increased skill 
in adapting the things to be taught to the capacity of the child. 

It is this motor knowledge of psychology, this knowledge 
that expresses itself in increased skill in stimulating the mental 
activity and development of children, and this alone that has 



INTRODUCTORY 15 

value for the teacher. For purposes of polite and learned con- 
versation or argument, for the ability to understand history, 
sociology, ethics, civilization, life, a knowledge of psychology is 
serviceable, because there is an interpretative as well as a con- 
duct-influencing phase of psychology. But the way to secure 
this interpretative value of psychology, its culture value, is to 
secure the motor value which includes, of necessity, the other. 
After all, not what one knows, but how his doing is affected by 
his knowing is the essential thing. 

II. MOTOR KNOWLEDGE OF THE AIMS OF EDUCATION. 

No teacher can reach his highest efficiency without a liv- 
ing knowledge of the aims of education. One may follow out 
a prescribed course of study and teach it with great skill, so 
as to be advanced with great regularity so far as increase of 
salary is concerned, and even so as to be given social homage 
and individual love and devotion, but, after all, he may be like 
a mole in the ground. To be most efficient in teaching geogra- 
phy, for example, one should be conscious of the function of 
geography in realizing the aims of education. To be thus con- 
scious of adapting means to ends is to be an artist. 

Nor is it enough for superintendents and supervising teach- 
ers alone to have this consciousness of realizing the aims of edu- 
cation by means of the studies and discipline of the school. So 
long as this is true, there will be mechanical, "wooden" teachers 
lacking in that finer quality which gives power and vitality to 
skill. 

Nor is it enough for teachers to be able to recite with 
due emphasis and intonation the catalogue of aims of education, 
as set down by educational philosophers, reformers, and enthu- 
siasts. There must be more than this. There must be an 
appreciation of what these aims are, and a correlative disposi- 
tion and power to realize them by and through the instrumental- 
ities of the school. This appreciation, disposition, and power 



16 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

is what is meant by a living, or a "motor" knowledge of the aims 
of education. 

III. THE CHARACTER OF A HELPFUL BOOK. 

Any book written with the hope of increasing the teach- 
ing efficiency of those who read it must either assume that the 
readers have that knowledge of psychology and of educational 
aims which is necessary to an understanding of the principles of 
teaching presented in the book, or it must present the psychology 
and educational doctrines in connection with the dicussion of 
these principles of teaching. The first plan is followed most 
frequently by writers of books on pedagogy and on teaching. 
Its assumptions are, in many if not most cases, contrary to fact. 

Besides, even though one knows psychology and educational 
ideals, the tendency in reading a book on pedagogy is to read 
rapidly and not to dwell on the similar or related ideas already 
acquired. Therefore, if the pedagogical ideas presented in a 
book are to have their greatest effect, the psychological laws 
needed and the educational ideals involved should be presented 
or suggested. This has been attempted in psychologies in which 
we find "pedagogical applications" following the successive 
chapters. Such books are better for teachers than either bare 
psychology or "commanded pedagogy." But if pedagogy be 
regarded as a series of problems, then whatever related materials 
are necessary to a solution of these problems can legitimately be 
introduced. Such a treatment of pedagogy will not be a series 
of commands or directions, not a schoolroom manual, but rather 
a series of principles reached through a consideration of school- 
room problems. It is the purpose of this book to treat pedagog- 
ical problems in light of psychological principles and of educa- 
tional aims, and thus to arrive at pedagogical principles. 

The purpose, however, in such a treatment of educational 
problems is not to make "converts," or to found a "system." 
The greatest service one mind can render to another is to 
stimulate that other to the best of which it is capable. And so, 



INTRODUCTORY 17 

in the following pages, though the treatment may be argumenta- 
tive and the conclusions be drawn in many cases without con- 
sideration of all the elements involved, the fundamental purpose 
is to stimulate those who read this book to face the problems 
fairly, and to endeavor to solve them for themselves. 



CHAPTER II. 

The Aim of Education, and the School as a Social 
Effort to Realize It. 

As a process, education is the change in the sequence or the 
character of one's mental activities. If one has had an experi- 
ence — say of falling from a tree — when he now sees a tree it is 
quite probable that he will think of the fall. Had the experi- 
ence been that of finding something good to eat on the tree, the 
tendency upon again seeing the tree would be to think of the 
thing that was good to eat. The order in which mental activ- 
ities take place (their "sequence") is changed by educative 
experiences. The character (or nature, or kind) of mental 
activities is also formed by the character of educative experi- 
ences. 1 A study of science gives one's mind a certain filling or 
"content;" a study of American history gives a different con- 
tent. The setting up of certain things for the child to learn 
implies that someone wishes to give a certain character to his 
mental life. 

Really, though, there can be no change in the sequence of 
mental activities without a change in their character, because 
the character of any particular activity is influenced by its prede- 
cessors. Suppose that, when one is feeling well, a door slams. 
His attitude is that of comparative indifference. But if he be 
ill, or worried about something, the slamming of the door is a 
different thing to him, because the value of a feeling is partially 
determined by its position in, and relation to, one's mental series 
as a whole. 

i The sequence and character of future mental activities are shaped by 
present activities. 

18 



THE AIM OF EDUCATION 19 

§ 1. THE AIM OF EDUCATION IS ALWAYS THE SAME AS THE 
CONSCIOUS AIM OF SOCIETY. 

The process of education is a process of othering, of building 
a world, of removing a tension, of changing the sequence or charac- 
ter of one's mental activities. It is, therefore, the inevitable result 
of one's coming into contact with a stimulating environment. But 
in what direction shall the process move? Toward what end? 

The mere existence of a body of people having common 
interests, a "social group," implies a social ideal. People in 
such groups have a notion of what they and others ought to be 
and do. Whether the group be an isolated family, a village, a 
state, or a nation, there is in the mind of every mature member 
of the group a more or less clearly defined ideal of what each one 
should be and do; and any such social group tends to utilize its 
resources for the realization of this ideal. For illustration: — A 
pioneer family think that their nine-year-old boy should be able 
to dig potatoes and carry chips into the house ; so they set about 
teaching him to do these things. The mature people of a village 
think that their children should know more about the life of 
plants and animals in the world round about them, and so 
nature study is introduced into the grades of the elementary 
school, or biology is made a regular study of the high school. 

The group connection of each individual to his fellows is 
manifold. For illustration: — I am a man, a son, a brother, a 
cousin, a nephew, an uncle, a brother-in-law, a teacher of 
psychology, pedagogy, ethics, sociology, a lecturer, a renter, a 
taxpayer; a resident of this town, of a certain ward, of a certain 
section of the city ; a consumer of coal, of food of many kinds, of 
clothing, of houses and house furnishings, of amusements, of 
streets, and of music; a member of this society and of that; a 
reader of this and that magazine. I have a certain relation to 
all the industrial and commercial processes which my direct 
social relationships imply. I am tied to my fellows in many 
ways; and for each and every such social relationship I have a 



20 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

partial view of what I and others ought to be and do. The synthe- 
sis of these partial views makes up my ideal of what others ought 
to be and do. Each person thus derives from his manifold 
relations to his fellows an educational ideal. In so far as the 
majority of a given social group have the same educational ideal, 
to that extent efforts for the realization of it will be put forth. 

It should be noted that this educational ideal is a pervasive 
thing as regards the social group, and also an inclusive thing. 
The social group sets up certain aims for itself. These group 
aims constitute the educational ideal. Hence the inevitable 
change of the educational ideal which takes place in successive 
generations. If the greatest (most revered) aim of a group be to 
conquer a given enemy, the education of the young of that group 
will converge to a single end, viz., the development of soldiers. 

Any social group, as indeed any individual, tends to realize 
separate ends successively, and so there will appear various ele- 
ments of the educational ideal corresponding to these various 
separate ends. A social group with a multiplicity of ends, seeks 
their harmonious realization through a certain coordination and 
sequence of them. The social group, as a group, sets up as its 
educational ideal those ends which it strives itself to realize. 

If there could be found a group made up chiefly of artists, 
the educational ideal of such a group would" include more draw- 
ing and use of color than would be found in the educational 
ideal of a social group employed in agriculture, or in one devoted 
to railroad transportation. If these three ideals appear in a 
single group, there may be the dominance of one ideal or the 
other as one sub-group or the other is in control; but gradually 
all three ideals would gain a partial recognition as the social con- 
sciousness of the whole group broadened. 

Attempting now to gather up the ideas advanced in this 
section, we may say: — 

(a) The social group, as a group, has an educational ideal 
which grows out of its group needs, experiences, and the ideals of 
its individual members ; 



THE AIM OF EDUCATION 21 

(b) To the extent to which this group educational ideal 
becomes a conscious ideal to the mature members of the group, 
to that extent efforts are put forth hy the group-whole, by the 
various sub-groups, and by individuals for the realization of that 
ideal ; 

(c) This group educational ideal is a complex, composite 
thing, having various elements in it; and consequently, various 
means and agencies for the realization of the various elements 
of the ideal will inevitably appear; 

(d) The group educational ideal is, therefore, a "variable," 
varying with (1) the successive dominance of the various sub- 
groups, (2) the change in opinion within the sub-groups, and (3) 
the inevitable change in the group which comes about in con- 
nection with what we call its development, evolution, or progress. 1 

§ 2. THE AIM AS A FORMAL, STATIC THING. 

It is evident from the preceding section that the group 
educational ideal includes what the group regards as best for 
it. Each group, of course, strives to perpetuate itself socially 
as well as physically. To do this, the young of the group must 
learn to perform the functions now performed by the mature 
members of the group. These functions are of two types, the 
actual and the ideal. The actual ones relate to the achieve- 
ment of ends, and to the control of material conditions ; the ideal 
ones relate to feelings towards persons, things, ideals, achieve- 
ments, and abstract relations. Therefore, one may describe the 
educational ideal of every social group (past, existent, or pros- 
pective) by saying that the educational ideal is to have others 
become what the social group is. This is a conventional, or 
"formal," an unchanging, or "static" aim, for the meaning of 
it is not rendered definite. So, too, to say that the educational 
ideal is the " development of citizenship" is a formal declaration, 
for just what is meant by citizenship is not definitely set forth. 

i Cf. Giddings' Elements of Sociology, pp. 330-353, and Small and Vincent's 
Introduction to the Study of Society, p. 2(32. 



22 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

So, too, "The formation of moral character," "The socializa- 
tion of the child," "The development of manhood" are formal, 
that is, as suitable in describing the educational ideal of the 
"Patagonians" as in describing that of any social group in our 
own country. 

It will be conceded, of course, that each person who uses 
any one of these phrases may have some meaning or other which 
renders it definite to him; and a group may have a definite 
meaning attached to such a phrase. The educational ideal, 
however, has this formal descriptive character; and we continue 
to use the words of a former age while putting into them a new 
or different meaning. 

§ 3. THE AIM AS A SPIRITUAL, DYNAMIC THING. 

It has already been intimated that while the phrase by 
which the educational ideal is 'described may remain the same, 
the meaning of that ideal is constantly changing, is, in reality, 
dynamic. The dynamic character of the educational ideal is 
the inevitable accompaniment of social progress. "New occas- 
ions teach new duties." The view of life, of what is of most 
worth, of what one should be and do, changes as the individual 
develops, and just as truly changes as the social group develops. 
Hence, the impossibility of determining the character of the 
educational aim of the future. 

This real element in the educational ideal, this element 
that brings it down from phrase to fact, from symbol to reality, 
is the meaning, or the "content," or the spiritual element of the 
educational ideal. This spiritual element is a reflection, or 
image, or representation of the social life of the group in which 
it is found. It begins as a mere feeling, a dim want, an impulse, 
and becomes defined and definite as efforts are made to realize 
it. For illustration: — The rural population of the upper Miss- 
issippi valley is now greatly interested in the "Farmers' Insti- 
tute." They began by discussing the most profitable breeds of 
sheep for wool and mutton, of cattle for beef and milk, of hogs 



THE AIM OF EDUCATION 23 

for meat, of feeding for growth and for fattening; then came 
discussions regarding improvements in roads, barns, houses, 
and implements ; then improvements in schools, social organiza- 
tions, — even political parties. The feeling at the basis of all 
this was at first dim and undefined; and it became definite and 
clear only as efforts were put forth in this direction and in that. 

It is by a succession and summation of similar waves of 
social feeling that the present educational institutions and the 
present curricula have been established. As soon as social 
feeling becomes defined, as soon as a means is found to satisfy 
the social need or want, another feeling appears.' And so the 
process goes on, day by day, year by year, century by century, 
epoch by epoch. 1 

But a social group is as much subject to habit as is an 
individual. The buttons on coat sleeves are no longer service- 
able, nor are they peculiarly decorative; but we are willing to 
have them there just because they are there, and because we do 
not care to distinguish ourselves from others by such a petty 
performance as the removal of them would be. Many tailors 
have said, in response to a question as to why the buttons are 
put on coat sleeves, "We always put them on," "Everybody 
does it," "It's the style." Twenty-five years ago the arith- 
metics contained Alligation; but this subject was in the arith- 
metics for exactly the same reason that buttons are still put on 
coat sleeves, viz., social habit. Once upon a time, computation 
by alligation was socially serviceable; one needed to be able to 
do it to act, or "function," as a social unit. Our courses of 
study are shot through and through with obsolete social adjust- 
ments which have no greater reason for being there than have 
the obsolete words of the dictionary for being a part of the vocabu- 
lary of the child. To the extent, however, that an obsolete 
social adjustment enables one to understand a present adjust- 
ment, it is still socially serviceable. The great fact to be empha- 

l See Judd's Genetic Psychology ; ' ; The Origin of Some of our Educational 
Ideals," pp. 69-97, and also Giddings' Elements of Sociology, pp. 53-87. 



24 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

sized, however, is that the social group is subject to habit, and 
that, as a consequence, the conservative element (doing as has 
been done) always appears in the educational ideal. A man 
who would not think of farming or keeping books as his father 
did may insist that the schools are all wrong because they are 
not conducted as schools were when he went to school. So 
strong is this conservatism in social groups that schools are 
usually the last social institutions to be regenerated. 

Notwithstanding all this tendency to perpetuate old social 
adjustments, there is clearly discernible the dynamic, spiritual 
element in the social ideal. The change in school curricula 
due to the introduction of the Pestalozzian ideals and methods, 
the Herbartian movement, the temperance crusade, the rise of 
the modern high school courses, 1 the elective system in colleges 
and universities, the introduction of science and nature study — 
all these, and many more that could be cited, show clearly that 
there is a spiritual, dynamic element in the educational ideal. 

§ 4. THE AIM AS ADEQUATE PARTICIPATION IN THE ACTUAL 
SOCIAL LIFE OF THE RACE, AND IN THE IDEALS OF THE RACE. 

Every social group has a certain consciousness of its rela- 
tion to the whole life of the race, a consciousness of its own 
segmental and partial character. Every such group is indebted 
to the past and to other social groups for all that in its life which 
is not the result of its own discoveries and inventions; and it 
also feels a duty and responsibility to other social groups, exis- 
tent and yet to be. In consequence of this consciousness of 
segmental relationships, every group has as elements of its 
educational ideal two things, viz., adequate participation in the 
present, actual life of the race, and adequate participation in 
the ideals of the race. "To get on in the world" expresses the 
first; "to help life forward" expresses the second. 

Adequate participation in the life of the race demands con- 
trol of many activities. Language is, in one way, controlled 



THE AIM OF EDUCATION 25 

and coordinated movement. 1 One needs to gain a control of 
language so that he may (1) understand others who use it as an 
expressive instrument, and (2) express his thoughts to others. 
This control enables one to participate to a considerable extent 
in the social life of the present. If we include reading and 
writing in the term language, control of language enables one 
to participate more adequately in the present because he can 
understand (1) descriptions of things which he can never see or 
hear, (2) accounts of what has been done in the past, and (3) 
the ideals and aspirations of men as expressed in literature. 
Since all language is, in a last analysis, nothing but an expres- 
sion, a symbolism of thought, one can interpret language only 
by the exercise of the imagination. And one can imagine things 
only in terms whose elements have been, in some form or other, 
facts of immediate experience. 

Therefore, back of the control of language as coordinated 
motor habit, there must be basal elements of motor experience. 
This motor experience should be extensive enough, either in 
the home or in the school, to give the basis for a genuine appre- 
ciation of the great types of human activity. There is as great 
reason for the city child to understand the fundamentals of 
agriculture as there is for the country child to understand the 
city's complex means of communication. Each should under- 
stand both, not primarily for economic reasons, but so that 
each may the more fully enter into the life of the race, and 
thereby live more completely and fully. 

But the life of the race has ideal elements, as well as actual 
elements in it. These ideal elements grow out of race or group 
experiences, and are influenced, if not largely determined, by 
the actual achievements of the race or group. Progressive 
approximation to ideals means the rise of new ideals. There- 
fore, adequate participation in the actual life of the race is the 

l Baldwin's Mental Development; Vol. II. Social and Ethical Interpretations, 
p. 128 if. 



26 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

basis for adequate participation in the ideals of the race, and 
should be supplemented by training along ideal lines. 

With the growth in the division of labor, in specialization 
of function, and in the consequent dependence of group upon 
group, there comes the sense of relationship to all those things 
which concern men. This sense of relationship we call the 
brotherhood of man. Therefore, instead of a purely group 
ideal, we find, in every civilized group, a race ideal. As men, 
looking up at the sky, saw at first only a multitude of separate 
stars, and later came to see a universe of which the separate 
stars are but parts; so, also, men, in contact with social groups, 
at first saw only separate groups each with its own exclusive 
interests, and later came to see the unity of groups in the life 
of the race. 

This vision of the unity of groups is forever blurred and 
shadowed by the selfish, or egoistic, tendencies of men; and yet, 
it is becoming progressively clearer through the centuries. Of 
late we have heard much of Anglo-Saxon unity, of Slav and 
Magyar, of Negro and of Indian ; but the Church forever reminds 
us of the unity of these races and nationalities in the fundamental 
unity of the human race. And so, in consequence of our social 
relationships, past, present, and yet-to-be, in consequence of 
the character of our primary experiences, we are coming to 
express the educational ideal as an adequate participation in the 
present life of the race and in the ideals of the race. The aim is 
the development of men — the "socialization" of the child. 

§ 5. HOW PARTICIPATION IS POSSIBLE. 

If we have correctly stated the aim of education, there at 
once appears the question, "How is this aim to be realized?" 
"What is the method of socialization?" For the sake of clear- 
ness we shall divide the answer to this question. 

(a) Any given social group has certain relations to the 
natural environment. The group may believe, as do savages, 
that there are essences in things and, therefore, fall down in 



THE AIM OF EDUCATION 2i 

worship before them. Or, the group may believe that things 
have no personality, that they are under law, that things are 
given men to use. Life is maintained, primarily, by getting into 
certain relations with natural things — food, air, drink, etc. 
The child, to become socialized, must gain a partial control 
over natural things, usually the partial control exercised by the 
group to which he belongs. This control is acquired, in large 
measure, by an imitative process which utilizes successive 
stages of muscular control. The child successively learns to 
hold the cup containing water, to get the water into the cup 
from, some containing vessel, to get the water from some (to 
him) primary source into the containing vessel, etc. He learns 
to eat things from his plate with his spoon, to get things from 
dishes to his plate, to get food ready for the table, etc. 

The limit to this activity is found in the permanent adapta- 
tions made by society. In early times a pioneer boy was taught 
to dig wells ; now the process usually stops with his knowing 
how to turn a faucet. Some people in the group must, however, 
know how to dig wells and how to pump water, or else all 
the faucets would run dry. The boy may not learn how to 
cook, but if some one did not know how to cook, the dishes 
on the table would be empty. It seems perfectly evident that, 
other things being equal, the more extensive one's real knowl- 
edge of the various controls over the natural environment exer- 
cised by his social group, the more intensive is his genuine 
socialization. A motor acquaintance with these primary social 
adjustments to natural conditions puts one into a sympathetic 
and appreciative social attitude, and gives him a power of con- 
trol which is conducive to initiative. 

What is called "Occupations" in some of our schools is 
founded on this idea. To make brick, to care for a garden, to 
weave cloth, etc., give the child the group feeling toward the 
maintenance of life, and bar forever that shallow and false 
notion that clerking is more dignified than farming. Such 
occupational education, while not striving exclusively for me- 



28 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

chanical skill or for economic efficiency, inevitably gives the 
fundamental feeling that "all socially serviceable labor is 
honorable." 

(b) The life of the group, however, includes more than 
this mere physical living. Social and mental life are the ends 
of physical living. Those who thus control the natural environ- 
ment think and feel and will. These mental activities are 
communicated to others by a complex system of symbolism. 
One can genuinely get into the mental life of those round about 
him only by translating the symbolical expression of this mental 
life into equivalent mental activities. Gesture is such a sym- 
bolism; so, too, is speech, writing, and art. If an American boy 
were placed among Chinese people, his only way of under- 
standing their meanings would be by an interpretation of their 
symbolical gesture, and even this would be faulty because their 
gesture symbolism differs from that which the boy has acquired. 
This illustration reveals the necessity for the child's acquaint- 
ance with, and control of, the means by which men express their 
meanings. 

The control of symbolism always has two phases, viz., an 
interpretative, passive association of meaning with symbol by 
virtue of which one is able to understand the meaning of those 
who use the symbolism, and an expressive, active association 
by which he uses symbols to convey his meanings to others. 
These two phases should constantly supplement each other, for 
only in their unity is to be found that relationship to life which 
gives vitality to mental activity. The language and composi- 
tion work of elementary schools should always be aspects of the 
studies which are thought-giving and thought-stimulating. 
Arithmetical symbolism should be related to quantitative rela- 
tions in which the child is interested. We may say that, in 
general, so far as there is a "new education" as distinguished 
from an "old education," the new education proceeds from 
meaning to symbolism, while the old education attempted to pro- 
ceed from symbolism to meaning. 



THE AIM OF EDUCATION 20 

It is instructive to those who are at all interested in the 
cause of education to learn how blind children are taught, how 
deaf mutes are instructed, how such women as Laura Bridgman 
and Helen Kellar have been educated. In all such cases the two 
phases of gaining control of symbolism stand out in clear relief. 
Even the method by which the child learns to use a new word 
in the home has enough of pedagogical revelation in it to produce 
a great change in the methods of some of our schools. 

(c) Implied in all that has been said in this section, is the 
idea that social life has a structure, an organization; and that 
the child, to become socialized must become a member of social 
institutions. Occupation accomplishes this partially, but there 
are social institutions other than those of industry. Whatever 
the institution may be, one really becomes a member of it only 
by being a member, by actually performing his part in the insti- 
tutional activity. These social institutions are organized rela- 
tions by which men serve each other and through which each 
man, by serving others, serves himself. To be socialized in any 
genuine sense, one must become a part of this fundamental in- 
stitutional life of the social group. He who lacks the ministra- 
tion of connection with a family is not completely social. If 
this lack is from early childhood, the individual may become 
anti-social. The unsocial are simply those who stand apart 
and refuse, for any reason whatever, to take part in social rela- 
tions. The games of children are of great value, therefore, 
because of the social relationships involved in participation in 
them. 

Summing up the section: — It is clear that participation in 
the life of the social group or of the race is possible, in a broad 
way, in so far as one (1) gains that control of the natural environ- 
ment which is exercised by the social group to which he belongs, 
(2) learns both passively and actively to control the mechanism 
by which men express their ideas, and (3) enters into the social 
life of the group by actual participation in its institutional 
activities. 



30 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

§ G. THE ORGANIZATION OF SCHOOLS IS A SOCIAL FUNCTION. 

It was learned long ago that certain of the things mentioned 
in the preceding section could be taught to twenty almost as 
readily as to one; and hence schools were organized as a matter 
of economy. The things most readily taught to a number of 
persons at once are those symbols by which men express their 
thoughts. Speech was taught in the homes, but reading required 
a more continuous and regular application than most homes 
could give. Also, because of its complex character, computa- 
tion was soon turned over to the school. The adaptation to 
natural environment was taught in the homes, the boys and girls 
learning to do the things their parents did. So, too, participa- 
tion in institutional life was omitted from the school. 

The ultimate motive, however, for the founding of schools 
was humanitarian — a desire to give to those who would not 
otherwise have it, the ability to understand the printed page so 
that they might get on better in this world and in the life to come. 
Nearly all systems of schools have sprung from some religious 
impulse. Our missionaries wish to teach the natives to read 
so that the lessons of the Bible may impress their heathen 
hearts. And even to this day, we hear every little while of 
some school founded and maintained by those who have such 
a motive. If, however, we confine our attention to the older 
universities of our own country we shall find that they were 
originally expressions of a religious motive. And no matter 
what is taught in a school, be it cooking, carpentry, the cat- 
echism, decimal fractions, the colonial industries, the forms 
of the personal pronouns, or what not, the fundamental purpose 
is that by and through the thing taught the child may become 
genuinely socialized. 

In every large group, however, there are those who soon 
recognize that a school may be made a good financial invest- 
ment. Private schools are established for the aristocracy which 
wishes its children to have a different environment from that 



THE AIM OF EDUCATION 31 

of the public school and a kind of polish and accomplishment 
in the fine arts, or else for those who wish rapidly to get some 
motor control or bit of technical skill by means of which they 
can earn a livelihood. Such schools, however, are always 
expressive of ideals of education different from those of the 
social group. 

Slowly, indeed, from the standpoint of the development 
of the race, there arises a social consciousness of the need of 
schools for the social group. With the clear social conscious- 
ness of this need, a public school is established; and, as social 
need becomes more clearly a matter of social consciousness, the 
character of the public school changes. Elementary education 
comes to include more than reading, writing, and arithmetic; 
secondary education is established and develops from devotion 
to the classics to an elective course filled with studies having a 
distinct social reference. 

The ideal of the public school is clearly the social ideal of 
adequate participation in the actual and ideal life of the race. 
If the homes do not furnish the children those primary forms of 
control over the natural environment which every adult should 
have, then the school should and must do it. If there is any 
thing which the expanding life of the child needs for its genuine 
socialization and which is not already supplied the child by any 
other agency, then it is the business of the school to supply it. 
The great benefit of group instruction lies not so much in the 
economy of it as in the social attitude which comes to those 
who are thus instructed. 

The growth of the public school ideal means the decline 
of private schools. The latter still flourish in certain aristo- 
cratic centers, especially for girls, whose education is still largely 
thought of as a series of unusual accomplishments and skill in 
social forms, and in places where the stress of making a living 
is keenly felt. But secondary schools are establishing business, 
commercial, and technical courses so that one may prepare him- 
self for economic efficiency in the public school. The scope of 



32 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the public school is enlarging as social consciousness becomes 
more and more alert, and it is not too much to assume that 
society will continue to approach that degree of self-conscious 
direction which has rendered individual achievement so suc- 
cessful. 

§ 7. THE REAL SOCIAL CHARACTER OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL. 

Society wishes to conserve itself and also to advance. 
Therefore it establishes an institution for the accomplishment 
of these two things. However it may have originated, what- 
ever its history may have been, the public school now stands 
as the conscious effort of society to socialize the young. This 
socialization includes all that is necessary for the development 
of the individual into harmony with the social pattern, and 
also all that is necessary to social progress. Socialization is 
more than knowledge, for it includes appreciation and con- 
scious doing of that which is valid for the group. The public 
school can never be held wholly responsible for all these things, 
but it can not escape the duty of having as its conscious aim 
this great aim of socialization. The real basis for judging of 
the efficiency of a school is the extent to which its pupils reveal 
in their conduct right attitudes toward life. For this end, then, 
are schools established; for this end, society taxes itself; for this 
end, and no other, are millions of children now under the guid- 
ance of teachers. 1 

l Compare with Dutton's Social Phases of Education, pt>. 3-36; John Dewey's 
School and Society; Butler's The Meaning of Education, pp". 17-31, 86-87, 108,112, 
120-122; Harms' Educational Aims and Educational Values, pp. 5-7, 13. 



CHAPTER III. 

The Meaning of Education as Determined by Its Aim. 

Having described the aim of education in terms of present 
social feeling, it is necessary to inquire into its meanings. These 
meanings always cluster about the actual things by and through 
which it is sought to realize the aim of education. Therefore, 
we have now to consider education as a process, from one stage 
to another, from the shifting, uncertain mentality of the new- 
born babe to the maturity of the adult. What phraseology best 
describes this process? It is because men look at this process 
with the bias of previous experiences that we find differences 
regarding the meanings of education. These differences should 
be studied with the idea of determining their relative worth as 
descriptions of the real nature of the educative process. There- 
fore, in this chapter we shall state the most important of these 
descriptions, examine the bias from which they spring, and 
endeavor to find a description which includes the essentials of 
the educative process. 

§ 8. EDUCATION AS A PROCESS OF ORGANIZING ACQUIRED HABITS 
OF CONDUCT AND TENDENCIES TO BEHAVIOR. 

William James, in stating that education is "the organiza- 
tion of acquired habits of conduct and tendencies to behavior," 1 
has most happily phrased the meaning many people attach to 
the educative process. This view arises from a contemplation 
of the vast function of habit in our lives. Habit rests upon a 
physiological basis, viz., the connection through a nerve center 
between a sensory stimulus and a motor response. Such a 
connection having been once established, there is such a result- 

i Talks to Teachers, p. 29. 

33 



34 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

ing modification of nerve structure that a similar stimulus 
tends to produce a similar motor response. In the brain, where 
there is a division between sensory and motor areas, we find 
different centers in different areas connected by nerve fibers 
which are called "association tracts." Therefore, as one learns 
to accommodate himself to any stimulus whatever, there is an 
organization of his brain, or, at least, a tendency to such organi- 
zation. And, further, since such simple responses as we have 
been considering above may be connected together, tendencies 
to behavior (conduct, motor response) arise; tendencies such 
that, on suitable stimulation, behavior of a definite kind results. 

Over and beyond this physiological habit and tendency, 
parallel with it, perhaps, there is mental habit and mental ten- 
dency. This mental habit and tendency together constitute us 
what we are and what we tend to become. The self is " the sum 
total of all one can call his own." 1 Therefore, education is the 
process of organizing acquired habits of conduct and tendencies 
to behavior. Education is both physiological and psychological. 
In arithmetic, for example, this is clearly seen. The so-called 
"number facts" become matters of acquired habit; so, too, the 
definitions and tables and the interpretation of arithmetical 
symbolism. These separate acquired habits become organized 
into a system which by its very structure has certain tendencies. 
These tendencies are of two kinds, viz., habitual and accom- 
modating. So, too, every subject taught in the elementary 
school or in college, every motor adjustment, every feeling that 
comes from activity — each yields an organized mass of acquired 
habits and also certain tendencies to behavior 

This is an attractive description of the process of education, 
and may be interpreted in a purely physiological sense. If so 
interpreted it makes education merely a process of brain organi- 
zation. Now, while with all education there is an organization 
of the brain, it does not follow that education is nothing more 
than this. But James may be interpreted to mean that the men- 

1 Janies, Briefer Course, p. 177. 



THE MEANING OF EDUCATION 35 

tal aspect of the individual is organized by and through his brain 
organization. Whether this interpretation can be substantiated 
or not, it seems consistent with all we know of developing mind 
to suppose that there is with the process of mental development, 
especially in its earlier stages, a parallel, antecedent, determining 
brain activity and development. 

As a description of the process of education, then, we may 
say that James, in the description quoted, has given a concise 
and illuminating account. But this account sets up no end, 
no goal to guide us in our attempted control of the process. 
We must confess, however, that it is no valid objection to a 
description of the process of education to say that it does not at 
the same time describe the end or aim of the process. Still, if 
an equally valid and significant description could be found that 
did include or imply the end it would be more acceptable. 

§ 9. EDUCATION AS A PROCESS OF GRAFTING SOCIALLY SERVICE- 
ABLE REACTIONS UPON, AND THEREBY SUPPLANTING, 
NATURAL TENDENCIES. 

This description is also best stated by James, 1 but is held by 
many others as well. It assumes that there are certain native 
tendencies in the child — reflexes, impulses, and instincts — some 
of which are serviceable and some non-serviceable. The de- 
scription also maintains that education begins when a socially 
serviceable attitude is grafted upon a natural tendency. The 
child naturally grasps for objects, and on this basis he is taught 
to pick up various objects, to hold his knife and fork, to hold 
a pen or pencil, to guide a chisel or plane, to wind a clock or a 
watch, etc., etc. So, with all the things a child is taught: — 
language is grafted upon the babbling impulse or instinct; ges- 
ture, upon the natural tendency to outline imitatively things 
thought of (the primitive motor tendency of all consciousness) ; 
art, upon the natural tendency to express in permanent form 

l Talks to Teachers, pp. 38-44. 



36 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

one's aesthetic appreciation ; mathematics, upon the natural ten- 
dency to count, etc. 

Were it not for these natural tendencies one would not be 
able to teach the child anything at all. The child must have, 
originally within him, the power to respond to stimulations and 
efforts or else there could be no response. As fast as the child 
thus grafts a new attitude upon an old attitude, the resultant 
is so much basis for teaching another new attitude, and so 
there is no limit to the number of things an individual may be 
taught — save this, one can never teach another anything that 
can not be grafted directly upon a natural reaction or indirectly 
upon an overlaid natural reaction. 

Further, this description concedes that there are certain 
natural tendencies that should be destroyed. Undesirable 
natural tendencies are destroyed by substituting desirable reac- 
tions for them. Again the process is one of association, as is the 
grafting process ; and the description is valid because all educa- 
tion is (whatever else it may be) a process of association. The 
weak point of the description is that it does not include the 
totality of experience-acquired character in the term natural 
tendencies. Natural tendencies soon become overlaid by ex- 
perience, and this derived level or mass of experience is just as 
valid a basis for education as are the natural tendencies. The 
description is valid, however, for the first things a child learns. 

§ 10. EDUCATION AS A PROCESS OF WIDENING THE GAP BETWEEN 
IMPRESSION AND EXPRESSION BY INHIBITION. 1 

All observers of young children have noticed that with them 
any impression of sufficient intensity is immediately followed by 
a reaction, and therefore agree to the law of nervous reaction, 
viz., every impression is followed by a motor response. Nat- 
urally, then, one reacts immediately to any stimulus. Soon, 
however, the child seems to hesitate, to hold back his response, 
to inhibit the motor tendency, to widen the gap between im- 

i See Davidson's History of Education, pp. 10-12. 



THE MEANING OF EDUCATION 37 

pression and expression. The appearance of this gap paves the 
way for. the rise of voluntary consciousness, for without it one 
could only know of his actions after he had acted. One essen- 
tial feature of education is that it enables one to see the result 
of his act before he acts. This gap is that which makes reflec- 
tion possible, is that which makes it possible for actions to 
be matters of consciousness before their realization. Were it 
not for these characteristics, human actions would forever be of 
the reflex type and one could never learn anything from his 
experience. 

Inhibition, physiologically speaking, is a contrary nervous 
current either arresting a positive current in the nerve itself or 
else causing a contrary set of muscles to act so as to negate an 
incipient movement. Psychologically speaking, inhibition is 
the checking of an impulse by opposing another to it, the arrest- 
ing of one idea by another idea. Hence, through inhibition, 
one's actions become consistent. Through inhibition, self-con- 
trol arises. 1 

This description is based upon the notion that all education 
is of the type of physical education, and it ignores the appercep- 
tive activity of mind by which data of various kinds are united 
into higher mental unities. In this apperceptive activity, inhi- 
bition plays no part at all. In fact, all apperception is a unify- 
ing, or synthetic activity which is, in a sense, the opposite of 
inhibition. 

§ 11. EDUCATION AS A PROCESS OF WORLD-BUILDING. 

Realizing the importance of apperception in all education, 
and realizing that the mental data resulting from it are not the 
same in character as the objective, material things surrounding 
us, some people 2 have described education as a process of world- 
building. By this description it is meant that each mind builds 
up a world for itself, constructs its own reality, develops a world 
of ideas. Education is this process, this inner activity of the 

1 Compare with Baldwin's Elements of Psychology, pp. 42-44. 

2 Notably Davidson, Educational Bev'ieiv, Vol. XX, p. 325, Nov. 1900. 



38 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

mind. In a sense, arithmetic has an objective existence apart 
from a child's mind, but it comes to have an existence for the 
child only as he constructs the relations for himself, as he thinks 
them, as he builds up within himself an arithmetical world. 
This constructive activity is the only real education — all else 
is but means to this end. In a sense, all things which are to 
become matters of consciousness at all, have an outer exist- 
ence at first; and the process by which the mind builds them 
up into related conscious unities is the process of education. 

This description, it will be noted, places all education on 
the plane of conscious world-building, and, hence, takes no 
account of that large fraction of life which is never conscious at 
all, and which, though dumb and unappreciated, still colors all 
one's conscious mental activities. Hence, the description is 
true only as it relates to the higher, or conscious aspects of the 
apperceptive process. 

§ 12. EDUCATION AS A PROCESS OF OTHERING. 

If any one takes the common "before and after" view of any 
educative experience, he will note that the individual, after his 
educative experience, is other than he was before. This other- 
ing process, whether toward the good or toward the bad, is the 
educative process. This view emphasizes the abstract aspect 
of the process of education, considered as a series of individual, 
separate changes; and it fails to note the taking -up-of-the-past- 
into-the-jiresent aspect of the educative process. Education is 
really a synthetic, progressive process, and is never adequately 
described by emphasis upon the essential character of the 
separate educative acts. This description, however, does set 
up the standard for judging whether an experience has been 
educative, and is, therefore, a valuable way of looking at the 
process. 1 

i My indebtedness to Dr. John W. Cook for this description has already been 
acknowledged. 



THE MEANING OF EDUCATION 39 

§ 13. EDUCATION AS A PROCESS OF REMOVING THE TENSION 
BETWEEN THE IDEAL AND THE REAL. 

If we analyze any voluntary act, we find that a conscious- 
ness of the end exists as an idea, or ideal, before the mental 
aspect called volition begins. There is, therefore, a tension, or 
strain, between the present, or actual self and the idea, ideal, or 
self -yet-to-be. The removal (not the mere denial or abandon- 
ment) of this tension makes the idea to become real, makes the 
self other than it was before. In the process of education, there- 
fore, there are two stages, viz., an establishment of such a ten- 
sion as has been described, and its removal. The business of 
the teacher is to condition pupils in such a manner that pro- 
gressive tensions are established in their minds. The business 
of the pupil is to remove, by his own activity and effort, the 
tensions thus established. 

If this process be analyzed a little more closely, the idea, 
or ideal, is found to be merely an aspect of the self which receives 
greater emphasis by this seeming separation and opposition. 
The ends which one holds before himself in this way are really 
aspects of one's self which are given an objective reference by 
the educative process. This felt tension and its removal is 
what Rosenkranz calls "estrangement." 1 A new object pre- 
sented to a child seems strange to him at first, but this sense of 
strangeness is removed just in so far as the child is able to inter- 
pret the object in terms of his own previous mental activities. 
It would perhaps be more in harmony with modern ideas and 
terminology to say that the mind projects under the form of 
ideas, ideals, or ends, certain aspects of itself, and by the realiza- 
tion of these ends becomes explicitly what before is was im- 
plicitly. 

The objection to this description of the educative process is 
that it denies the educative reality of any experience in which 
there is not a consciousness of the tension between the real and 

i He says (Philosophy of Education), p. 26: " In estrangement the mind sets 
itself over against itself and makes itself a special object of attention." 



40 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the ideal. The researches of modern experimental psychology 
tend to prove that much of our mental activity becomes con- 
scious only after we have performed it. And if this be true, 
and if all mental activity which organizes the self is educative, 
it is evident that the description of the educative process which 
is based on the analysis of voluntary experience is inadequate 
to describe those educative experiences that are involuntary. 

§ 14. EDUCATION AS A PROCESS OF BECOMING SOCIALIZED BY 

PARTICIPATION IN THE ACTUAL AND IDEAL LIFE OF 

THE RACE. 

Granting the elements of validity in the previously discussed 
descriptions of the process of education, they may be gathered 
into a unity and given a statement that is more significant in 
light of the interests and thinking of our modern life. The 
great influence of scientific evolution in giving us a method of 
thinking and of sociology in revealing the character and destiny 
of society finds ample recognition in the eagerness with which 
men utilize the results of these mental movements in considering 
the problems of education. This influence has already been 
acknowledged in our statement of the aim of education, and we 
wish now to test its worth in describing the process of education. 

Be the process one of removing a tension, of building a 
world, of othering, or what not, it is also true that it is a process 
by which one becomes as others are, or, as one thinks others are. 
Socialization is this process. But one becomes as others are 
only by participation in social life, in social relationships. The 
social life of the race, or of any group, however small and narrow 
it may be, has two phases, an actual phase and an ideal phase. 
Entrance into the ideal phase is possible only from the actual 
phase. Ideals grow out of present reals, and, hence, all efforts 
at reformatory education begin by establishing an environment 
which will give the individual a worthy real. All efforts at 
formation, as well, rest upon the recognition of this relation of 
the real, or actual, to the ideal. 



THE MEANING OF EDUCATION 41 

Socialization begins with the child's participation in the 
life of the family, is broadened by his childish plays and games, 
by the imitative acquisition of symbols and manners of acting, 
by association with other children on the street and in school, by 
his various skills and motor controls, by his imaginative inter- 
pretation of distant social conditions, industrial processes, and 
manners of living. The growth and development of concep- 
tual thinking lets the child into an appreciation of the nature of 
external (and mental) relations, and thus becomes the basis for 
the elaboration of ideals and of efforts to realize them. The 
ideals of the race have been elaborated out of its experiences, 
and there is in the child a correlative (if not closely correspond- 
ing) development, or evaluation, or elaboration of ideals 

Using the data of psychology, we can easily sketch, in rough 
outline, the stages or levels in this process of socialization. 

There is first the stage of reactive behavior, of responses to 
stimuli that form the child's consciousness by virtue of the re- 
sponses themselves. Here belong random, reflex, impulsive, 
and instinctive reactions, as well as the whole realm of action 
that comes from suggestion and unconscious imitation. 1 By 
thus doing as others do, the child comes to feel as others feel. 
Through laughing at certain things, crying at others, respond- 
ing as others do to thunder storm, railway train, house cat, etc., 
the child gets a sense of the value of these various things. In- 
evitably the child is formed into a certain character by his reac- 
tive behavior. 

The various ideas of movement, of feeling, and of meaning 

acquired by reactive behavior serve as so much material for the 

second level, or stage, of socialization, viz., conscious imitation. 

The "copy" furnished by the family situations keeps the child 

busy for a long time. The reproduction of this copy, bit by 

bit, lets the child into an appreciation of the real nature of social 

relationships and real activities, and it also acquaints him with 

l In the chapter on "Method in Education," a fuller description of these 
processes will be foui.d. 



42 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the symbolism by which men express their meanings. There 
are real social activities and symbolical social activities. The 
imitation of a real social activity, such as sawing wood, making 
a pie, etc., gives, directly and inevitably, its meaning. The 
imitation of a symbolical activity, however, carries with it no 
such sense of meaning. The great and crowning blunder and 
danger of school education is the effort to get children to imitate 
conventional activities for which they have no equivalent mean- 
ings. The movement should be, in all primary education, from 
the real activity — from the meaning — to the symbolical expres- 
sion. This process continues until the individual has gained 
control of the symbolism by which men express their meanings. 

Having gained control of the symbolism by which men 
express their meanings and having also a stock of meanings 
acquired by his experiences of the reactive and imitative types, 
the child enters upon the stage of interpretation of symbols. 
Men have expressed many of their meanings in symbols, and 
by his imaginative interpretation of them in terms of his experi- 
ences, the child grows into those experiences of the race which 
he could never directly experience (history and literature). The 
child's actual experiences thus become a basis of interpretation 
not only as regards the printed page and oral language, but also 
as regards all the symbolical activities of men. The forms of 
politeness, arts, and the institutions of men yield up their ideas 
to him. 

Each level equips the child with certain controls and powers 
which render it possible for him to set up ends for himself, to 
form ideals, and to initiate activities. These activities seem to 
be the quintessence of independence, and yet they had their 
basis in social relations, their very existence is possible only by 
virtue of a society of which they are not independent, and their 
final worth depends upon the sense of worth held by the social 
group. At this stage one becomes his own teacher, in a sense; 
and yet one's obligation to achieve through invention and leader- 
ship a higher level of attainment and of ideal for the race is 



THE MEANING OF EDUCATION 43 

socially derived and is the motivation to "the achievements of 
our manhood's years." 

There are many ways of learning, and hence there are many 
valid methods of teaching. But always, by learning, one is 
becoming. This progressive becoming is the concrete process of 
education, and were there no organized society from which one 
receives stimuli, and no persons to give one a sense of the worth 
of his activities, he would never become the person that he does 
become. The whole range of mental experience is colored and 
warped by the presence of persons. This concrete aspect of 
mental activity is essential to any adequate conception of the 
process. One never fully knows a locomotive until he appre- 
ciates the relation of locomotives to life. In fact, the relation of 
locomotives to life is the essential thing about them. And so 
the essential thing about a child's mental activity is the influence 
of that activity in organizing him into a more effective social 
being. 

In light of the social view of education, the process of edu- 
cation takes on a significant meaning. The one comprehen- 
sive end takes in the multitude of smaller ends that otherwise 
become obstructions to the process. The material must meet 
one unswerving requirement, and the process must be judged by 
its social reference. Social efficiency, of the actual and ideal 
types, is the aim of education, and the process is one of organi- 
zing an individual in such a way that he actually and ideally 
participates in the life of the race. 1 

l Compare with. Home's Philosophy of Education, pp. 97-167. 



CHAPTER IV. 

The Materials of Education, or the Things That May 
Be Used in Realizing the Aim of Education. 

The views advanced in the preceding pages as to the aim 
of education and the character of the educative process may be 
further tested by a consideration of the materials of education. 
If the commonly used materials of education can be shown to 
have a social reference and a socializing value, the whole matter 
will have a stronger position and defense than can be afforded by 
direct argument. 

§ 15. AN ANALYSIS OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOL SUBJECTS TO SHOW 
THEIR IMPLICIT SOCIAL REFERENCE. 

If a course of study for elementary schools be examined, 
one finds, at least, the following studies: (a) language, including 
oral and written language proper, reading, writing, spelling, 
grammar, and drawing; (b) arithmetic; (c) geography; (d) his- 
tory; (e) literature; (/) construction work in some form or other; 
and (g) nature study. 

(a) It is obvious that language is a social product, a sym- 
bolism by which men convey their thoughts to each other. 
Language is more than simple expression, for when one uses it, 
his purpose includes the interpretation of it by another. This 
mutual sharing in each other's thoughts is desirable on social 
grounds alone. There is no value in talking to people if they 
do not think in consequence of the talking. There is, of course, 
a reflex value even when one uses language to express ideas, but 
fundamentally language is a device by which one gains the power 
to understand the thoughts expressed by others, and also, the 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION 45 

power to convey his thoughts to others. These two phases of 
language may be called passive interpretation and constructive 
use, respectively. 

If oral language be analyzed one finds it to be made up of a 
coordinated series of unmeaning sounds. This coordinated 
series of unmeaning sounds has, through a process of social 
acceptance and use, become conventionalized. The gesture 
element that accompanied all primitive language has been 
largely eliminated, and oral language is now (especially in 
English) almost a pure sound symbolism. Written language 
is, in a last analysis, nothing but a coordinated series of marks. 
This arbitrarv and conventional character of language is ample 
proof of its social origin. Taken apart from the mental realities 
which it is designed to express and convey, language is abso- 
lutely meaningless. 

Reading is the interpretation of the symbolism of the printed 
page into equivalent images, ideas, thoughts. The real reason, 
then, for teaching reading is that the child may gain the power 
to get the thoughts which others have expressed in written form. 
But why do we wish the child to get the thoughts which others 
have expressed? So that the child may be able to think for 
himself, is the reply. And why think for himself? So that he 
may more fully enter into the life of the race, so he may be more 
broadly and more genuinely social. 1 

Writing is a device for talking to an absent person, for ren- 
dering permanent the thought that would otherwise be fleeting. 
Writing is just the reverse of silent reading, viz., a process of 
conveying thought to others by a mark symbolism. If there 
were no social necessity for thus expressing one's meaning, 
there would soon be no writing in existence. Spelling is just 
the conventional way of joining certain marks together to make 
words. It is not a thing which is worth while for its own sake — 
it is but a means to an end. When writing and spelling are 

i In oral reading the element of conveying the thought obtained from the 
printed page to others is added to reading. 



46 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

isolated, the child loses interest in them, for they then become 
purely formal things. 

Grammar is the body of organic uniformities that appear 
in a language. There are just two fundamental questions that 
are answered by grammar, viz., What does the sentence mean? 
What is the function of the separate elements of the sentence in 
expressing the meaning of the sentence? Grammar thus in- 
cludes a study of sentence-analysis (word, phrase, and clause 
relations), and of word variations. However much one may 
know of the details given in many grammars, the only practical 
value of grammar is the ability one gets from his study of it to 
grasp the thought of a sentence at a glance and to frame sen- 
tences that express thoughts accurately. The social reference 
and utility of this power to get the thought instantaneously and 
accurately and to convey it accurately is too obvious to need 
further comment. 

Drawing and color work are not wholly ends in themselves. 
The ability to draw something that looks like a cat, a landscape, 
a house, or a Chinaman is valuable as a means of conveying 
thoughts about things to others. If it be held that through 
drawing objects the child comes to observe the objects more 
closely and thus to know them more adequately, the question 
still remains, W T hy is it desirable that the child should know the 
object more adequately? An intimate knowledge of things, 
ability to draw, and ability to paint may give rise to satisfaction 
that is purely individual. But even through such individual 
and egoistic activities the person is being formed so that his 
attitude towards others is changed thereby. The meaning and 
value of the drawing and art of to-day could never be experienced 
by one whose life had been solitary. So, while conceding the 
egoistic element in all art, we must also recognize its power of 
forming and revealing social attitude. 

This rather long discussion of language is for the purpose 
of showing that all the things considered here have really arisen 
out of social necessities in the life of the race, and that by gaining 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION 47 

control of them the child is enabled to enter more adequately 
into the life of the race. The fundamental motive in teaching 
them, then, must be effective social participation. 

(b) Just as soon as barter gave way to money-exchange, 
definite units of measurement for different kinds of things arose. 
It needs no argument to prove that arithmetic developed, as a 
body of organized knowledge, from social needs. Nor does it 
require an argument to prove that the really serviceable arithme- 
tic of to-day is that which is an aspect of social relationships. 
The bearing of these facts on method is important, but their 
bearing upon the view which the teacher ought to take of the 
subject itself is more important. The elimination of methods 
of computation that are no longer socially serviceable shows the 
responsiveness of the subject, despite the traditions of the school, 
to social demands. The social origin of arithmetic and its obvi- 
ous social relationships are sufficient proof that the real purpose 
in teaching it in the elementary school is its socializing influence. 

(c) Geography was originally a writing about the earth, 
an account of what explorers really knew about the earth and 
an assorted collection of speculations about what they did not 
know. Maps were a shorthand way of telling graphically what 
was known about various countries. Gradually, as commerce 
expanded, it was deemed of value that as many as possible 
should become intelligent about remote regions and customs. 
Trade increased and places to know about multiplied. The 
location of places on the map became the great geographical aim. 
Map drawing was a device introduced to assist children in 
memorizing location. The social consciousness of even the 
most conservative communities rebelled against this dreary 
treadmill of insignificant repetition, and any change whatever 
was welcome. 

The physiographic ideal of geography, the consideration 
of those great forces which are constantly operative upon the 
material of the earth, replaced in many schools the dreary round 
of memorizing meaningless things. Geography was defined as 



48 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION . 

"the Science which treats of the earth in its relation to man," or 
"the earth as the home of man." But in the time allotted to 
it, the geography class never got beyond the earth nor very far 
into it — much less to man. The character of the soil, climate, 
and seasonal changes greatly influence the occupations, ideals, 
and social institutions of men. On the other hand, the influence 
of men upon natural things merits consideration. What geogra- 
phy deals with is really a mutually correlative interdependence 
of man and the earth. Geography deals with the concrete ad- 
justment of man to the earth. What geography includes is a 
very simple matter, viz., how men adjust themselves to nature 
so as to make a living ; and, having made a living, how men ad 
just themselves to each other so as to live. 

If one should ask an advocate of the physiographic study 
of geography, "Why should the child study geography?" the 
answer would be either that it is worth while for the child to 
know these things for their own sake, or that by knowing these 
things the child can understand how men adjust themselves to 
the earth. But what makes a knowledge of physiography 
"worth while" to the child? The answer to this question will 
commit one to the apparently indefensible knowledge view of 
the aim of education or to the social view. 

Or, again, if adults ask themselves what of real worth they 
learned from their school study of geography, they will answer 
that they learned the typical ways in which men adjust them- 
selves to nature, and how men live in organized societies. This 
answer reveals the educative aspect of geography and shows its 
true social reference. It is because teachers have felt the need 
of a school subject dealing with the essential and typical ways 
in which men wrest a living from the earth and with the typi- 
cal ways of social living that the content of school geography 
has changed. 

(d) W T hat is called history is just this human adjustment 
to the earth and to social groups as it was made by us yesterday, 
by our fathers, by our forefathers, by any and all the social 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION 49 

groups that have lived in the past. Civics is but the organized 
governmental efforts which are made so that men can live to- 
gether peaceably and decently. Now, it is obvious that not all 
history is equally worthy of preservation and study by subse- 
quent generations. But, whatever be our criterion of selection 
of the aspects of history that merit emphasis, the value of the 
past adjustments of the race, to the individual who learns of 
them, is to be found not in the knowledge itself, but in the de- 
gree to which the individual is thereby rendered more efficient 
socially. The unconscious recognition of this criterion of values 
is the force that has changed the content of our elementary 
school histories from a collection of dates, statistics, and ac- 
counts of battles to a systematic account of how society has 
evolved. 

(e) But men dream about social relationships as well as 
participate in them. These dreams of possible social adjust- 
ments, with all the play and interplay of motive and result, con- 
stitute the realm of literature. Even the fairy story with its 
moral detached has a higher educative value than the pleasure 
of the child in it or the development of his imagination by means 
of it. This higher thing is a budding sense of how people ought 
to behave in social life, and a beginning of action in harmony 
therewith. The blood-and-thunder story is demoralizing just 
because of its influence on the child's sense of himself-as-related- 
to-others. Often the value of literature as a means of individual 
culture is emphasized, but there can be no true culture that is 
wholly, or even characteristically, egoistic. If through literature 
one falls in love with fields and brooks, his attitude toward 
others is thereby changed. And if "literature is a product of 
life," then the study of it ought to mean more life to him who 
studies it. In fact, it is just this relation to life that makes 
literature to be what it is. 

(/) All modern schools include some forms of construction 
work in their courses of study, either as busy work or as a regular 
part of the work of the school. The first construction work in 



50 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

schools was probably as pointless as Yv T as Pestalozzi's pupils' 
counting of the cracks in the plaster of the ceiling. Much of 
the paper folding of fifteen years ago was clearly of this type. 
But when construction work came to be considered as a means 
of education its character changed greatly. The change was in 
the direction of having pupils make those things that have a rela- 
tion to life. Weaving, per se, has given place to the weaving of 
rugs, hammocks, and receptacles of various kinds. With the 
construction of things that have a social relation comes the possi- 
bility of growth into a clearer and clearer social consciousness. 

(g) Emphasis upon the knowledge ideal of education and 
upon the study of words as the best method of gaining knowl- 
edge, inevitably led to a neglect of the natural world. Three 
different groups of reformers attacked the schools. One group 
held that the economic value of a knowledge of nature's ways is 
sufficient to warrant a study of nature by pupils in the elementary 
school. Another maintained that the aesthetic enjoyment that 
results from a close companionship with nature justifies putting 
nature study into the curriculum. The third group, composed 
chiefly of trained scientists, urged that the mental value of the 
" scientific method of thinking" is so great that all elementary 
school pupils should acquire this method of thinking. To these 
separate claims must be added the influence of the writings of 
Comenius, Pestalozzi, and Froebel. 

It is no wonder, then, that there is the widest diversity of 
material included under the terms nature study and science, and 
that there is the greatest diversity of opinion regarding the 
values of the study. The further fact that most people rely 
upon "specialists" for their views upon this subject, renders it 
difficult to write upon it without assuming the attitude of a 
partisan. 

Economic serviceableness, aesthetic enjoyment, and scien- 
tific thinking have a value only as by means of these things the 
individual becomes socially efficient. If one's aesthetic enjoy- 
ment of nature leads him to turn his back uoon mankind and 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION 51 

to lose himself in nature so completely that he loves a crippled 
bird more than he loves crippled children, if he loses himself in 
adoration of a "parasite upon the intestine of an earthworm" so 
completely that he forgets to use his scientific thinking with 
respect to matters of great social significance — well, savagery 
would be preferable to social life among people of this type. 
"The truth shall make you free," not of its own intrinsic worth, 
but by its applicability to life. Against aesthetic enjoyment in 
its right relations to life, no word of criticism can be uttered; 
but aesthetic enjoyment of nature should dispose one to see more 
of beauty and loveliness in mankind. The attainment of the 
power of scientific thinking should awaken a desire to serve one's 
fellows by means of it. The economic returns of a knowledge 
of how best to fertilize a "sour loam" should result in a higher 
ideal of life for the farmer who pockets the returns. 

It is possible, of course, to study natural things in their own 
relations and with no reference to the present needs and the 
ideals of men; but such a study belongs, if anywhere, to a later 
period of the individual's development. If the power of scien- 
tific thinking could be developed only by a consideration of a 
portion of nature unrelated to man, such a study would be 
defensible in the elementary school. There is, however, ample 
opportunity for scientific thinking on nature as related to man 
to occupy completely the elementary school period. 

If the above position be defensible, it follows that the nature 
study of our schools should be determined upon the broad 
grounds of social reference rather than upon the narrower 
grounds of economic value, aesthetic enjoyment, or mental dis- 
cipline. 

This entire section is a brief and imperfect effort to show 

that the studies of the elementary school are essentially social in 

their reference. 1 The elementary school, in an imperfect and 

general way, includes those things which the social group re- 

UniV. E. A. Proceedings, 1901, pp. 124-131, there is a similar treatment by 
Prof. George E. Vincent. 



52 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

gards as a minimal prerequisite to effective social participation. 
Therefore, as social conditions change within the group, there 
is a correlative change in the content of the curriculum. If, as 
Dewey has said, the changes in the curriculum are due to social 
pressure, it must be that a more or less clear social consciousness 
supports and warrants the curriculum all the time. 1 

§ 16. AN ANALYSIS OF THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION AS INSTI- 
TUTIONS, INDUSTRIES, SCIENCES, ARTS TOGETHER 

WITH THEIR SOCIAL REFERENCES. 

This whole matter of the social reference of the materials 
of education may be looked at from a different point of view. 
In the previous section the social reference of the separate 
studies of the elementary school curriculum was shown. In the 
present section the materials of education are to be analyzed as 
consisting of (a) Institutions, (b) Industries, (c) Sciences, and 
(d) Arts. 

(a) Institutions — The child is born into the family and 
grows through it to the social groups which are called the com- 
munity, the school, the state, and to the various institutions sup- 
ported by the community and state. An institution is simply 
an organized method of social behavior. Whether he live in 
savagery or in civilization, the child can not escape institutional 
life — he must come into organic relations with his fellows and 
must acquire a method of behavior with respect to them. Insti- 
tutions change with the centuries and even from year to year; 
old institutions pass away and new ones arise; and yet, regard- 
ing the life of any one person, they are fairly constant. 

Now, if it be true that social life centers about institutions, 
it follows that social participation is possible only by participa- 
tion in institutional life. It is not necessary to participate in all 
institutional life, for the images derived from participation in 
some institutions enable one imaginatively to construct others 
in terms of actual participation. 

1 JV. E. A. Proceedings, 1901, pp. 832-848. 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION 53 

But institutions have a history; they have evolved. There- 
fore, to know the institution fully, one must re-live its life — to be 
genuinely social, one must know and appreciate the history of 
society. Moreover, institutions are developing now, and hence 
the duty of the individual to influence wisely the present and 
future of the institutions of society. To be fully civilized is to 
participate intelligently in the present institutional life of the 
race and to help that life forward. The extent to which one can 
enter sympathetically into the institutional life of others and help 
that life forward measures his genuine civilization. 1 

(b) Industry — Man's wants are of such a nature that he 
must put forth effort to obtain that which will satisfy them. Re- 
mote as well as immediate wants demand satisfaction. The 
more man knows and the broader and deeper his feeling, the 
more he wants. Good food, comfortable houses, beautiful 
things, the ownership of broad acres, a bank account, etc., are 
the products of labor. The putting forth of energy for the at- 
tainment of a given end is industry. "Industry conquers the 
world," transforms the world of elements into forms that pro- 
duce satisfaction. Every individual either produces, directly or 
indirectly, the utilities which he uses to satisfy his wants or else 
he lives on the bounty of others. So fundamental is this idea of 
self-support that he who has not learned it lacks something of 
the human touch. 

As civilization advances, the division of labor renders each 
person's industrial task less inclusive and more specialized. 
There is a clear economic gain in the division of labor, and a loss 
in breadth of industrial accomplishment and social sympathy. 
If there be naught but economic efficiency sought in the indus- 
trial life of the individual, he becomes "a mere shred of human- 
ity" — a "Man With the Hoe." A broad acquaintance with the 
typical forms of human industry is desirable on social grounds, 
for with these typical forms of industry comes a sense of their 
social reference. The construction work of elementary schools 

i Rosenkranz, Philosophy of Education, p. 140. 



54 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(including manual training) aims not at skill, or economic effi- 
ciency, primarily, but at genuine socialization. 

Industrial effort becomes the basis for mental work, for 
concentration, for thinking. It is almost impossible for one 
who does not know how to work to learn how to study, for study 
is work. Versatility in typical industrial effort is the basis of 
mental versatility. That so many successful men in business 
and professional life have had wide industrial experience is more 
than a coincidence. 

Granting the attainment of skill in a few forms of industry, 
it is readily seen that the broader one's knowledge of industrial 
processes, the broader is the reach of his social sympathy, the 
keener is his judgment of the true relations of things, and the 
more discriminatingly ethical may his conduct become. 

Industry has, of course, a social reference. A man does not 
work simply that he may live, in the physical sense of that term. 
Life is more than the maintenance of those relations which enable 
men to keep on breathing and walking. To have social contact, 
to mingle with men, to feel the presence of those who love the 
things that we love, to feel that we are of service to our kind — 
this it is to live. 

(c) Science — Through his contact with nature, fellowman, 
and institutions, man finally discovers in them uniformities, or 
laws, or principles. Similar or related principles are slowly 
grouped together into unities called sciences. Science is the 
form which knowledge, as divorced from the feeling and voli- 
tional elements of concrete mental activity, tends to take. A 
science is a body of principles having an organic connection 
among themselves, as psychology, biology, grammar, algebra, 
etc. Science is the universalized element of racial experience. 

Herbert Spencer has shown in a conclusive way that the 
sciences have been developed from the arts. A need exists; 
some method of satisfying it is found; this method is perpetuated 
by tradition and social habit; with the increasing division of 
labor, the method in use becomes more skillful ; finally, the causal 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION ,5o 

relations between the various steps in the process are known and 
controlled; this knowledge is science and this control is indus- 
trial art. 

In order to enter fully into the life of the race, one must be- 
come scientific — must construct, or re-construct, the knowledge 
which has been organized by the race. This task soon becomes 
too great for any one person to achieve, and so a selection of 
science material is made. The principle of selection is social 
serviceableness. For example, a boy who is to become a farmer 
would profit more by a study of the chemistry of the soil than by 
a study of astronomy, if he could study but one. But the real 
social serviceableness of what may be taught one is practically 
impossible of determination in advance of his actual life develop- 
ment. We can only say that the race has certain fundamental 
interests from which certain sciences have arisen, and these the 
child should learn for he has, or there may he developed in him, 
these racial interests. 

(d) Arts — The term arts applies to the concrete doing of 
things in a certain way, whether this concrete doing be con- 
trolled by principles or not. There is an art of printing, an art of 
shining shoes, an art of handling a saw, an art of waxing floors, 
etc., etc. Then there are the mechanic arts in which certain prin- 
ciples (science?) control the steps in the concrete doing; and the 
fine arts in which certain principles that concern the production 
of the beautiful control the original production of things that 
satisfy the aesthetic sense. Reading, writing, spelling^computa- 
tion, map drawing, etc., are school arts. The making of gaso- 
line engines is a mechanic art. The painting, the "Sistine 
Madonna," is an example of fine art. 

The relation of what are here called arts and mechanic arts 
to social situations is evident. Nearly all arts are imitatively 
acquired. Mechanic arts imply imitation and scientific think- 
ing. The fine arts are the realm of originality and invention, 
but the function of imitation and scientific thinking in them is 
clearly recognizable. And without social copy, social need, and 



5G ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

social acceptance of the product there would be no arts at all. 
The purpose in this section was to show that all institutions, 
industry, science, and arts arise from social needs and that by 
participation, performance, and reconstruction of them the child 
becomes truly socialized. This fourfold classification includes 
all the materials that have ever been used for educative pur- 
poses, and in every one of them the social reference is clear and 
unmistakable. 

§ 17. THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION AS EQUIPPING ONE TO 
ACT EFFECTIVELY AS SUBJECT TO (a) NATURAL LAWS, 
(b) INSTITUTIONAL LAWS, (c) ETHICAL LAWS, 
AND (d) SPIRITUAL LAWS. 

The emphasis may be changed a little by saying that educa- 
tion is the process by which one comes to act effectively in 
any relation whatever. 

(a) Natural laws — The individual is obviously in relation 
to the natural world. This world is one of law and order. If 
the child simply followed the impulses that arise within him, he 
would never become an adult at all. A young child is perfectly 
ignorant of the existence of the law of gravitation and will walk 
off an elevated place with no thought of possible injury, and he 
does not know that a hot stove will burn him. These illustra- 
tions are typical of the child's lack of knowledge of natural laws. 
One phase of his education is the learning of how to behave with 
respect to these fundamental natural laws. 

(b) Institutional laws — The social world with its manifold 
institutions is just as truly a world of law as is the natural world. 
Leaving out of account one's adult duty to help life forward, the 
child must learn to conform to institutional laws. He becomes 
truly human by such conformity. 

(c) Ethical laws — Back of mere social conformity is the 
question of why one conforms — back of mere action is the matter 
of motive. The presence of motive marks the rise of ethical con- 
sciousness. The good, whether it be external and objective or 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION 57 

internal and subjective, is not capricious. Consciously to con- 
form one's life to the good as one conceives it, is to be obedient 
to ethical laws. Ethical laws, so far as they have a content at 
all, relate to conduct that concerns others as well as one's self. 
The Golden Rule with the " others" left out is meaningless. 
All ethical action, however, is an end in itself and never a means 
to an end. If one follows the Golden Rule for the sake of the 
reward which comes from action in harmony therewith, his 
conduct may be prudential but it is not moral. 1 

(d) Spiritual laws — Religion is perhaps best described as 
one's belief about his relation to the Author of the universe and 
also the various aspects of one's thinking and conduct which "are 
influenced by this belief. Religion implies a goodness, right, 
justice, etc., that exist independent of all institutional and hu- 
man interests. It is thus beyond the confines of ethics, for it 
systematizes and universalizes the things which are merely im- 
plied in ethical conduct. The reflex and vitalizing influence of 
religion upon ethics and institutional life, therefore, is as great 
as is the influence of these things upon religious conceptions. 

Whether this analysis of the realm of possible individual 
adjustment into natural, institutional, ethical, and religious laws 
be exhaustive or not, it will make it clear that he whose life is in 
harmony with all these laws is truly educated. If this be true, 
then the process of education is one of becoming socially efficient 
by living up to the measure of these laws, and the materials 
of education are those things which equip one thus to act 
effectively. All these laws have a social reference and a social 
value. The ideal social individual must conform his life to 
these laws, not slavishly (though this may be a necessary stage 
in the educative process), but willingly. 

§18. THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION MAY BE DESCRIBED AS 
INCLUDING ALL THAT ENABLES ONE TO MAKE AN HONOR- 
ABLE LIVING BY SERVING OTHERS HELPFULLY. 

Self-support through social service is the duty of every 

i Dewey's Psychology. Chapters on Prmlential and Moral Control, pp. 387-416. 



58 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

mature person. If this be one's duty, then all the things that 
contribute to this end are really materials in that person's edu- 
cation. If it be one's lot or choice to be a carpenter, the tools, 
the bench, the various woods, the instruments for measuring 
buildings, the nails, the locks, hinges, etc., are really teachers, 
are really materials of education. There is nothing in the wide 
world — from soil to theory, from brick to sentiment — which is 
used in making an honorable living but that may become ma- 
terial in some person's education. Everything that enables a 
stone mason to make an honorable living by serving others help- 
fully is really the material out of which he quarries or builds 
himself. One should not merely make an honorable living — he 
should live honorably. All forces, sunsets, floating clouds, flow- 
ers, poems, philosophies, all things through whose contact life 
assumes a higher tone are educative materials* The plaintive 
song in the twilight, the symphony, the moan of the winter wind, 
the ripple, or the tide may be the source of emotions that color 
subsequent life. All that is capable of influencing life attitudes 
is educative material. 

This view does not belittle books as educative material, 
but it does recognize the incontrovertible fact that other things 
are as truly educative material as is the book. It is possible 
that one through a knowledge of books becomes capable of serv- 
ing others helpfully, but this is not the exclusive avenue of gain- 
ing the power of social service. In fact, it is only as books are 
a summary of a wide range of concrete experience, into whose 
meaning the child grows by his study, that they are valuable at 
all. Realities only are educative. 

It is thus evident that the so-called studies of the school are 
educative materials, but it is equally evident that they are in no 
sense the exclusive educative materials. The very fact that 
teachers try to relate these school subjects to the lives of pupils 
is ample proof that adequate and effective living is the great 
thing sought by the schools. The view here emphasized formu- 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION 59 

lates a standard in terms of which relative educative values are 
to be estimated, viz., serviceableness to honorable living. 

§ 19. KNOWLEDGE, CHARACTER, AND CULTURE SHOULD BE 

INTEGRATED PHASES OF THE EDUCATIVE PROCESS, AND 

THESE ELEMENTS SHOULD COME FROM THE USE OF 

ANY OF THE EDUCATIVE MATERIALS. 

Knowledge, though frequently adored, is seldom under- 
stood. If one knows the boundaries of Switzerland, he can 
reproduce them at will. If one knows how to find the volume 
of a regular solid, he can reproduce the necessary steps when- 
ever he chooses. If one knows the Vicksburg Campaign, he 
can reproduce mentally the plans and events of that historic 
movement. In all these cases the element of mental control 
appears and also the element of mental synthesis, for there is 
the putting of things together in a series in the very act of con- 
trol. Knowledge may thus be defined as a controllable series 
of mental syntheses. We may also assume that a thing is a 
body of relations. To know a thing, then, is to reconstruct the 
relations which constitute a thing to be what it is. 

There are, however, degrees of control. For illustration : — 
A man was once able to give, understand, and apply to Cwsar's 
Commentaries the rules regarding the use of the subjunctive as 
these were given in Harkness' Latin Grammar; but he is unable 
to do this now. A person once learned to diagram sentences and 
this he is still able to do. These illustrations describe transient 
and permanent knowledge. Permanent control arises through 
what we call use, or application of knowledge to the varying situ- 
ations of life. It is use of knowledge that produces an organiza- 
tion of the self. It is, therefore, possible for knowledge that is 
itself transient to be truly formative, though not in the sense of 
formal discipline. 1 The real purpose, then, of having children 
learn is that through the mental control implied in knowledge 
a desirable organization of the self may result. 

i Hinsdale's The Dogma of Formal Discipline, in Educational Bevieiv, Vol. 8, 
p. 128 ff ( and also in his /Studies ill Education. 



60 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

Now this desirable organization of the self is exactly what 
is meant by character. 1 Therefore, through the acquisition of 
knowledge, character is formed. What one knows becomes an 
integral part of himself through its expression and use. Hence, 
whether desired or not, children's characters are being formed 
by their plays, games, studies, etc., as well as being revealed by 
them. 

If the self that is thus being formed gives evidence of being 
in essential harmony with all the fine things that help spiritual 
life forward, the self is cultured. There is no limit to culture, 
and, hence, no one can tell how much another has of it. 

Culture is not, as many people seem to suppose, a con- 
trollable veneer which can be imitatively put on. It is rather 
the power to enjoy those forms of activity that relate to mental 
and spiritual as opposed to physical welfare. From the psycho- 
logical point of view culture is mental activity in terms of 
ideals, meaning by ideals "those forms which we feel our con- 
cepts would take if we were able to realize them in a satis- 
fying degree of harmony, proportion, universality, and signifi- 
cance." 2 When the concepts which arise through the use of 
knowledge are projected into ideals, or interpreted in terms of 
ideals, culture begins. 

It is the stopping with the simple control that renders most 
knowledge of so little value in character formation, and it is the 
failure to interpret things in ideal ways that prevents culture 
from being integrated with knowledge and character. If a 
blacksmith interprets his work in terms of its broad relations 
to human welfare he is cultured, but if he interprets it simply in 
terms of present control or simply as a means of making a living 
he is lacking in culture. This shows why the so-called prac- 
tical things are lacking in culture elements, and why so many 
practical men are destitute of culture. This view also shows 

1 Character is what one is, but it has also come to mean a self that is essen- 
tially good. 

2 Baldwin's Elements of Psychology, p. 283. 



THE MATERIALS OF EDUCATION 61 

why culture conies often only with wealth, and why it is fre- 
quently the accompaniment of leisure. 

The effort to establish social cast on the basis of knowledge 
of a certain exclusive and narrow kind has resulted in partially 
divorcing the schools from real social life ever since democracy, 
as an aspiration, first found lodgment in social consciousness. 
And, so, too, the effort to establish an aristocracy of exclusive 
culture has been constant and futile; futile, because culture, in 
a democracy, can never be exclusive ; constant, because the world 
is always supplied with people who " forget the base degrees by 
which they did ascend." 

Knowledge, culture, and character; no one of these can be 
what it should be without the others ; undue emphasis upon one 
spoils the others, for even motive should be supplemented by 
knowledge and culture. Therefore, the proper use of any of 
the educative materials should result in the formation of a self 
that is wise, ethical, and cultured. 

In whatever way the materials of education be considered, 
it is evident that there is in the material both a mental activity 
and a form by which this mental activity is expressed. The race 
has expressed its mental life in symbols, in industry, in art, in 
science, in institutions, etc. The child must re-make, re-dis- 
cover, re-invent, re-believe, and re-live this race inheritance; and, 
because of his own social environment, must gain the power to 
express his mental experiences to others. Knowledge, char- 
acter, and culture cannot be transferred to the child ready-made. 
Each person, to get these things at all, must produce them for 
himself. 

This inner, mental activity is the content — the meaning — 
the significance of things. The various ways in which this con- 
tent may be expressed constitute the form. In the evolution 
of the race, the form has always followed the content, but the 
pedagogical blunder of all ages has been the implicit belief that 
the child can get content from form. 



62 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

In this chapter, the materials of education have been ana- 
lyzed in various ways to reveal their true social and socializing 
nature, and thus to set in clearer relief the social view of the 
process and aim of education. 



CHAPTER V. 

Method in Education, or the Re-Creation by the Child 
of His Race Inheritance. 

Having now discussed the aim, the process, and the ma- 
terials of education, the problem arises, How does the child re- 
create (mentally and objectively) his race inheritance? The 
aim of education is made real just to the extent that the child 
becomes socialized, becomes a good citizen, a moral character, 
etc. The process of education is the removal of a tension, an 
othering, an organization of acquired habits of conduct and of 
tendencies to behavior, the building of a world, etc. The ma- 
terials of education have a social reference — especially the ma- 
terials of elementary education. The social group wishes to 
control and direct the process of education. The method of 
education must be based on the w T ay in which the child's mind 
develops. This brings method back to psychology for its 
foundation- 
Method of teaching is simply the reverse of the process by 
which the child's mind learns a new thing, for teaching is caus- 
ing another mind to. learn. The mind learns by experience, by 
its interpretation of the new in terms of the related old, by 
working over the data given through sense-contact with the 
world, by unfolding its own inner and innate powers, by realizing 
its nature by expression, etc. Every answer to the question, 
How does the mind learn a new thing? is really an analysis of 
the term experience. And so such an analysis is now entered 
upon, but it is hoped that the treatment of it under separate sub- 
topics may not be interpreted as a concession that there is no 
fundamental unity in mental experience, 

63 



64 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

§ 20. INVOLUNTARY EXPERIENCE, OR MENTAL ACTIVITY RE- 
SULTING FROM MOVEMENT. 

The child is born with a bodily organism such that motor 
activity is the inevitable result of contact with the things that 
make up his environment. When a few days old the child gives 
evidence of a consciousness of having acted. How conscious- 
ness is connected with the nervous activity of the brain, no one 
knows; but that it is connected in some way, no one can deny. 
There are various forms of pre-conscious motor activity that 
may be specially named and described in this connection, pri- 
marily for the purpose of showing how through involuntary 
experience the mind develops. 

1. The nerve-cells may reach so high a state of internal 
tension, or of unstable equilbrium that a discharge of the energy 
outward occurs. The infant's arms and legs move when one 
can assign no objective stimulus as the cause. Such internally 
initiated movements are called spontaneous. The nervous sys- 
tem is so arranged that whenever a muscle acts, sensory nerve- 
endings in the muscle are stimulated, and so every spontaneous 
movement is the cause of in-going impressions that may reach 
the brain. If these in-going impressions have sufficient intens- 
ity, they will be the occasion of a consciousness of having acted. 
In this way the child's consciousness may be developed to a 
limited extent. 

2. The nervous and muscular connections already estab- 
lished at birth are such that many peripheral stimuli of sufficient 
intensity are inevitably followed by definite responsive motor 
activities. All such motor activities are called reflex. It is held 
by some psychologists that there can be a consciousness of the 
sensory stimulus directly, while others hold that the conscious- 
ness of the sensory stimulus (or that which is referred to the 
sensory stimulus) is an inference from the consciousness of the 
motor response to the sensory stimulus. The phenomena of 
reflex action support the latter view, and thus strengthen the 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 65 

view that, genetically considered, consciousness arises on the 
basis of motor activity and develops with it. 

3. There are, however, many stimuli that appeal to some 
special sense organs and are not followed by any definite, pre- 
dictable motor response. The stimulation seems to travel in- 
ward to the nerve centers and then to be deflected outward in — 
now one channel and now another. Sometimes the whole mus- 
cular system is affected, because of excessive central discharges. 
Such action is called sensory to distinguish it from the reflex and 
spontaneous action already described. Regarding sensory con- 
sciousness, one may say that, whether consciousness follow im- 
mediately upon the stimulus or mediately upon the motor 
response, consciousness is organized and develops because of 
the motor element in sensory experiences. 

4. The nervous system is, at birth, so organized that tenden- 
cies to discharge in some direction or other exist in it. Every 
additional experience, while it may modify the existing nervous 
organization, leaves the nervous system with a tendency to dis- 
charge in a certain way. This tendency is impulse of the ner- 
vous type. If this conception be carried over to consciousness, 
it is evident that any present organization of consciousness in- 
evitably means tendency to mental action of some kind or other. 
This mental tendency is impulse of the mental type. All im- 
pulse, then, is tendency to action because of present organization. 
Impulse naturally leads to action of which one is conscious 
only after the action occurs, and, hence, mental development 
that arises because of impulsive action belongs to what has 
been called "involuntary experience." 

5. A pre-natal connection between a sensory nerve-ending 
and a muscle enables one to understand reflex action and sensory 
movement. If now one thinks of a number of sensory nerve 
endings connected in a very complex way with a series of related 
muscles, and this latter series having such connection with still 
other muscular series that a single stimulus may start the whole 
series, one has the physiological conditions of instinct. All 



66 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

cases of instinct imply a present complexity of movement and 
also a serial complexity. 1 A bird's building of its nest is usually 
cited as instinctive. To fly to a distant place, get a twig, and 
put it in its proper connection with other twigs is a complex act. 
To keep at this process day after day, to use finer twigs and even 
feathers to line the nest — this is a serial complexity. Whether 
instinct be reducible to a combination of impulses and reflexes 
is of no importance here. There are such complex series of 
movements performed by many animals, and by means of them 
the consciousness of the animals is developed. 

6. Granting the inborn nervous structure already outlined, 
and granting that the complexity and connectedness of this ner- 
vous structure is increased by the kinds of experience already 
outlined, we are in a position to understand how a stimulus, pre- 
sented to a complex structure, may provoke a strong likeness to 
a conscious response. It is widely known that some people when 
asleep respond in a seemingly intelligent way to questions that 
are asked them, provided only that the questions be of a kind 
that the person has already dealt with. This phenomenon is 
called "physiological suggestion" for the reasons just explained. 
There is no present consciousness of the answers and no subse- 
quent memory. The influence of such responses in the forma- 
tion of habit or tendency to action, however, is perfectly evident. 

7. Through the sensory-caused actions already spoken of 
a structure and tendency are produced. This structure and ten- 
dency may exist either pliysiologically or mentally, or both. 
Physiological suggestion, as illustrated above, seems to have no 
mental activity in it at all. But when a child learns to go to 
sleep when rocked, there is a mental response to the stimuli of 
the rocking. A child soon learns that a certain sound on the 
stairs means its father's arrival. Here there is a sensory stim- 
ulus that awakens, or excites, or causes the revival of a previous 
consciousness that was connected with a similar stimulus. All 
such suggestion is called " sensori-motor suggestion" because 

i Baldwin's Elements of Psychology, p. 328, 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 67 

the stimulus simply connects with a previous consciousness that 
was motor in its origin. Through sensori-motor suggestion the 
child's mind is formed into certain definite modes of responsive 
activity. 

Nearly all the tricks of animals are just of this sensori- 
motor type. Pain is followed by an action, and the trainer then 
gives some pleasure. A sign from the trainer means incipient 
pain. The thought of the pain is connected (through repeti- 
tion) with the action and its subsequent pleasure. Either, then, 
because it can not help it or because of its desire for the pleas- 
ure, the animal performs the desired activity. When the trick 
has been learned, the sign from the master is a sensory stimulus 
that suggests previous experiences and that results in the per- 
formance of the trick. 

8. The same principle of suggestion is seen in "ideo-motor 
suggestion." What are called ideas are associated with symbols 
or with certain stimuli. The recurrence of a stimulus or the 
symbol recalls the idea with all its associates of action and 
feeling. Often, as one watches small boys playing ball, he 
catches himself making a series of incipient movements much 
like those the boys are making, and yet these movements are not 
imitative. The visual impressions give rise to an idea in con- 
sciousness ; the idea reinstates its former motor accompaniments, 
and one is then conscious of certain incipient, even diminutive, 
movements and feelings. When one sees a bicyclist wabbling, 
he is very likely to put out his feet as he has done in the past to 
prevent his own falling from a bicycle. At a basketball game, 
former players frequently play in this incipient way. The child's 
desire for a drink at night is often intensified by the motor ten- 
dency of ideas that are awakened by suggestion. 

What is called the connotation of words is really nothing 
but suggestion. The words of our childhood's years have been 
attached to varied experiences, and these experiences had a 
higher emotional intensity than do most of those of later life. 
Riley's The Old Swimmiri Hole and Field's Little Boy Blue 



68 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

really touch us because of our previously organized experiences. 
Browning's poetry, for a similar reason, appeals only to those 
who have reflected deeply on life's problems. 

These various forms of involuntary activity have been 
described to show how the mind, or consciousness, develops in 
response to the stimuli of the environment. In all the cases 
cited, there is a motor response to a stimulus. If there be any 
consciousness at all, it is primarily a consciousness of this motor 
response and secondarily of the stimulus. The brain structure 
is modified by experience and thereby acquires both organiza- 
tion and tendency. Consciousness is organized by and through 
such experiences as have already been sketched, and thus takes on 
structure and tendency. Consciousness is not, even at this stage 
of its development, simply a picture of the world of stimuli, nor 
is it simply the mechanical or dynamic resultant of the stimuli 
that have played upon the brain. The most we can say is that 
the character of the experience (and experience is the mental 
response to a stimulus) is dependent upon the stimuli of the 
physical environment. 1 

In all the experience here roughly and imperfectly sketched 
there seems to be nothing but the sway of the law of the conser- 
vation of energy. Stimuli are followed by motor responses; con- 
sciousness attaches to some of these responses and not to others, 
and seems to attach to those of the greater intensity. The motor 
response is greater than the stimulus, and this is due to the fact 
that the effect of the stimulus upon nerve or nerve center is to 
destroy its equilibrium and thus to liberate energy. 2 Matteuci 
found that in frogs the ratio of stimulus intensity to motor- 
response intensity is 1 to 27,000. Consciousness, whatever it 
be in its essence, can develop only under the condition that 
stimuli are present. Cherries can grow and ripen only under 
proper conditions of soil, climate, heat, and moisture; but cher- 
ries are more than these things in any definite collective com- 

i The body is a part of the environment as here considered. 
2 James, Briefer Course, p. 120. 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 69 

bination. If cherries were simply a collective combination of 
these things, we should be able to gather them from hickory 
trees, gooseberry bushes, and ragweeds. And so, while mind 
can develop only under certain conditions of brain and stimuli, 
it is always more than these things are. 

§ 21. CONSCIOUS IMITATION. 

The organization of mind that results from the kinds of 
experience thus far outlined exists, as has been said, as structure 
and tendency. Because of what is known of the activity of the 
mind, two assumptions must be made in order to explain all the 
known facts. These two assumptions are: 

1. The mind has the power to dissociate experience into 
parts, segments, fragments. 

2. The mind has the power to combine these parts, 
segments, or fragments of experience into new wholes. 

It is also assumed that the mind can do the things implied 
in these two assumptions either consciously or unconsciously. 
The simple, ordinary flow of experience tends both to break up 
and to unite previous experiences. This analysis and synthesis 
may occur and one be conscious only of the result, or one may 
remain unconscious of the result, or the process may be preceded 
by a consciousness of the result as it is to be. 

In the previous section it was shown, in considering sensori- 
motor and ideo-motor suggestion, how this double process of 
analysis and synthesis may go on unconsciously and be followed 
by a consciousness of having acted. It may be helpful to use a 
more familiar terminology in this connection. Whenever inner 
mental life takes on the form of an objective presentation, be it 
material stimulus or suggested idea, the activity is an imitation 
of that objective presentation or suggested idea. If this imita- 
tion occurs attended only by a consciousness of the result, it is 
unconscious imitation. If it occur preceded by a desire to 
achieve an end, preceded by conscious analytic and synthetic 
processes, the activity is called conscious imitation. 



70 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

Conscious imitation has two phases, viz., an inner, mental 
synthesis which also implies analysis, and a motor synthesis 
which implies the synthesis of previously dissociated motor ele- 
ments. In the simpler forms of conscious imitation, these two 
phases are parallel and each implies the other. In the higher 
reaches of symbolism, one may exist without the other. By 
conscious imitation pupils can learn how to spell and pronounce 
the word synderesis, and yet make no new mental syntheses. 
This simple motor aspect of conscious imitation is often called 
"bare," or "mere," imitation. This sort of formal, wooden, 
lifeless imitation is possible only when the activity is one that 
is concerned with an arbitrary symbolism. One can not imitate 
a real activity, such as that of a gardener, without getting more 
than the mere formal aspect of the activity. 

In fact, it is by the imitation of real, human, social activities 
that the child becomes human and social. The objective stimu- 
lus or situation awakens a desire to reproduce it for one's self. 
Efforts follow and whether the end be secured or not, there is a 
changed self — changed as regards its structure, organization, 
power, tendencies, and consciousness of itself. In conscious 
imitation, previous elements of experience are related and 
synthesized because of their felt fitness in reproducing for one's 
self an objective presentation or copy. 

A fifteen month's old child watches the movements of her 
mother's lips as the latter sings to her. The child puts her 
fingers on the mother's lips and then tries to move her own. 
Each imitative effort brings a new sense of selfhood, a new 
integration of power and tendency. All this accords with the 
various descriptions given of the process of education, but it 
waits upon the presence of the copy. Many of the adult's 
mental attitudes have been thus imitatively acquired, and many 
things can be acquired in no other way. This does not mean 
that imitation is the only or exclusive method of mental develop- 
ment, but it certainly is an important method; and whenever a 
symbol is to be connected with its appropriate idea, imitation, 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 71 

based on association by contiguity, is the only method of forming 
the connection. 

§ 22. DISCOVERY. 

Things seem to exist in certain relations to each other, and 
the mind establishes within itself relations which are assumed to 
correspond to the objective relations of things. Several of the 
ways in which this is done have already been discussed, and 
other methods of mental development are now to be considered. 

The mind makes many syntheses and finds some of them 
confirmed by objective relations. Syntheses thus confirmed by 
objective relations are called discoveries. To discover is to 
uncover, or lay bare, and, hence, one can, in any deep sense, 
discover only what exists already. Many of his syntheses are 
regarded by the child as corresponding with objective reality, 
but are later found to have insufficient confirmation, as is seen 
in the child's belief in the reality of the rainbow. 

Discovery is sometimes used in the sense of the mere acci- 
dental finding of something, as when one speaks of the discovery 
of gold in California, of copper in Michigan, etc. No thinking 
preceded such accidental finding and very little followed directly, 
except as regards the location of the things in question. 

Some chance discovery, however, is of the causal type and 
excites thinking. The Bessemer process of making steel was 
discovered by chance while air was being forced into molten 
iron for a wholly different purpose. The significance of the 
discovery for the individual intensifies the vividness of the causal 
connection and often makes it a lasting one. For example: — A 
young housewife put a can of beans into the oven to heat, and 
upon taking them out, at once opened the can with a can-opener. 
The hot liquid spurted upward and burned her face. The great 
fact that liquids expand with heat was by this chance discovery 
more firmly established in her mind than it had been by her 
study of physics. All chance discovery is forced on us, and, 
lacking in significance, much of it is soon forgotten. 



72 ELEMENT ART EDUCATION 

In purposed, or planned, discovery, however, the presence 
of the purpose and of the hypothesis indicates a great complexity 
of mental operations. The hypothesis is a "mental construct" 
in either image or conceptual terms, and is dependent upon past 
experiences. For example, an electric doorbell fails to ring, and 
one wishes to discover what is wrong with it, He may say to 
himself that (1) the push-button may be out. of order so that no 
connection is made; (2) the connecting wires may be broken; 
(3) the battery may be "dead;" (4) the bell may be out of ad- 
justment. These hypotheses are based on previous experiences, 
and one forms an hypothesis because he can not tell a priori what 
is the matter with the apparatus. One knows, however, that 
batteries "run down," and so he first tests the battery. If the 
battery is all right, the next hypothesis relates to the bell itself. 
If one change the adjustment and the bell then rings, he con- 
cludes that he has discovered the cause of the bell's former fail- 
ure to ring. But after one has fixed the armature several times 
within a year he goes to it at once when the doorbell refuses to 
ring. The hypothesis as to the trouble becomes a single one 
based upon past experiences. The maid, however, probably 
simply knows that the bell does not ring — she has no theory as 
to why it does not ring, and it is doubtful if she would ever dis- 
cover the cause. 

In purposed discovery, it should be noted, the relation of the 
result to the hypothesis is noted at various stages, and thus the 
mental activities are more firmly and clearly associated in the 
mind of the discoverer. For example: — A child goes out to find 
in what kind of soil toad-stools grow. Having found some toad- 
stools and examined the kind of soil in which they are growing, 
he forms an hypothesis which is, be it supposed, verified by his 
later searchings. This fact enters more firmly into his system 
of ideas than it would have done had he been told outright. 
This forming of many associations is simply the process of allow- 
ing things, in the language of Supt. N. D. Gilbert, to "soak 
in"; it is the process by which the knowledge is absorbed, i.e., 



METHOD IN EDUCATION <o 

the new thing is no longer isolated but is tied-in with other 
things. 

For the reasons just given, then, the relation of things 
purposely discovered to one's real life is usually more vital than 
is the relation of things accidentally discovered. Some things 
are purposely discovered and also soon forgotten. College 
students have been known to discover the laws of falling bodies 
by experiment and forget them before examination day. The 
reason for this lies in the fact that these laws had little or no 
relation to their welfare — save as the latter depended on their 
success in examination. Theirjpurpose was not a genuine out- 
growth of their vital interests in life, but was a purpose sug- 
gested by the instructor and touched the self only as do the 
particles in a rope of sand. In order that a discovered thing 
may become a permanent acquisition, it must be tied-in with 
ends or ideas about which one really cares. 

Discovery most frequently refers to a mental synthesis 
regarding the relation of a cause and its effect. By observa- 
tion, experiment, and reflection the child can discover that 
clouds are formed by the expansion of warm air laden with 
moisture, that the use of the cotton gin made slave labor profit- 
able in the South, that England has good reasons for wishing 
to keep possession of Gibraltar, that parenthetical clauses 
should be indicated by some kind of symbolism, that the volume 
of a cone is equal to one-third of the volume of a cylinder having 
the same base and height, etc., etc. Just as the race has, by 
mental syntheses, built up much of its knowledge, so, too, the 
child may be so conditioned that he shall discover the relations 
for himself. 

It is evident that there are many things which the child 
may learn either by conscious imitation or by discovery. It is 
evident, also, that, in general, the syntheses of discovery imply 
a greater degree of self-activity, of internally initiated mental 
activity, than do the syntheses of conscious imitation. There- 
fore, other conditions being equal, it is more genuinely develop- 



/4 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

ing for one to discover things for himself than to learn them by 
conscious imitation. The laboratory method is the method of 
discovery, while the usual study-recitation plan is the method 
of conscious imitation. Qualifying conditions as to the use of 
discovery as a schoolroom method are: 

1. Many things can not be learned by this method at all. 

2. There are so many things that might be discovered that 
it is impossible for any one person to discover more than a small 
fraction of them. 

3. Many things which the child could discover by long 
and patient effort are not worth the energy they cost; that is, 
some things would better be learned imitatively and the time 
thus saved be spent in the discovery of simpler and more valua- 
ble things. 

§ 23. INVENTION. 

Invention is the self-initiated combination of previous ele- 
ments of experience in new ways. The material thing we call 
an invention is simply an expression of the internal reality, and 
is the test which determines the validity of the invention. Imi- 
tation follows an external copy; invention has no copy, external 
or internal. Invention is an original synthesis of previously 
acquired elements of experience. The only original thing about 
an invention is the synthesis. 

All the materials which go to make up the cotton gin existed 
prior to its invention by Eli Whitney. Whitney simply brought 
these materials into new functional relations with each other. 
He faced a condition — the slow extraction of cotton seeds by 
hand — and set about devising an arrangement of revolving teeth 
(substitutes for human hands) which would rapidly remove the 
seeds from the balls. In invention, a new way of performing a 
process is substituted for an old way; the self -binding harvester 
is a substitute for the reap-hook and the binding of grain by 
hand; the typewriter is a substitute for the process of writing by 
pen or pencil. If a certain end is to be reached, he who can see 
a way of his own to that end is an inventor. 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 75 

It may be, however, that one does not know any process by 
which the end may be reached. Any one of the famous puzzles 
(the magic keys, the Chinese puzzle, the match puzzle, etc.) 
is, when one first examines it, an illustration of this lack of power 
to invent. In such a case, one forms a tentative theory of a proc- 
ess which may bring about the desired end, and then attempts 
to realize his theory. There may be more than one way of 
reaching the desired end and there is, therefore, as regards the 
process side of it, more than one invention possible. Each 
person who finds for himself a way to the end is an inventor. 
Invention thus seems to be, on the psychological side, a utiliza- 
tion of the elements of one's past experiences for the purpose of 
reaching an end by a process which was not known to him 
before. 

Therefore, the fact that a thing or process has already been 
discovered or invented by another is no bar to one's discovering 
or inventing it. 

§ 24. SELF-ACTIVITY. 

It should now be clear that self-activity means a minimum 
of passivity and a maximum of activity of the self. All mental 
activity depends upon a primary stock of mental experiences. 
Efforts to teach a girl who had been deaf-blind from the age 
of ten months failed because she had no primary stock of mental 
experience to elaborate. 1 The elaboration of mental experience 
into higher integrations and syntheses is the essence of mental 
development. The child has already acquired a large stock of 
primary experiences when he enters school, and has already done 
much toward working this over into higher forms of mental 
experience. The function of the school is a twofold one, viz., 
to supply the child with those primary forms of experience which 
he has not had and which are necessary as a basis for his socializa- 
tion ; and to condition the child in such a way that he, through his 
own effort, elaborates his primary experiences into those forms 

l Frank Hall, Aurora, 111., formerly Supt. of 111. School for the Blind, is 
authority for this statement. 



76 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

which are essential to participation in the actual and ideal life 
of the race. If the child re-creates the content of his race inherit- 
ance through discovery and invention, independence and self- 
reliance in thinking as well as originality, inventiveness, and 
moral integrity inevitably result. 

The mental activities already sketched are rendered socially 
serviceable and communicable by means of arbitrarily selected 
motor activities, or signs, or symbols. In a last analysis, oral 
language is nothing but a series of unmeaning sounds that are 
produced by physical movements. Written language is nothing 
but a coordinated series of marks made by motor activity. 
Mental reality comes to exist by and through self-activity. 
Symbols are associated with their correlative mental realities 
only by a process of repetition, of sheer association by contiguity, 
of imitation. The development of the child's mind is, therefore, 
a thing that has two aspects, viz., progressive mental syntheses, 
and an adequately expressive symbolism. The expressive 
symbolism is valuable only as it is truly expressive of mental 
syntheses. The first concern of all education, then, is the estab- 
lishment of conditions that actually stimulate individuals to 
mental syntheses. To make the acquisition and control of 
symbolism, or even the acquisition of knowledge, the first con- 
cern of education is a fundamental error. 

§ 25. AN EXAMINATION OF OTHER TERMS USED IN DESCRIBING 
THE METHOD OF EDUCATION. 

If from these considerations we turn to an examination of 
other terms used in describing the method of education, we shall 
perhaps understand more clearly what has already been said on 
this subject and at the same time see the validity of the examined 
terms. 

1. OBSERVATION. 

Our word observation, which means to look at, is our equiv- 
alent for Pestalozzi's word anschauung. By this word Pesta- 
lozzi meant the mental activity which takes place in the presence 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 77 

of an object, what has been called sense-intuition. This activ- 
ity is, essentially, the mental grasping of the relations of the object 
in question, the discovery of its connectedness. This discovery 
of connectedness is dependent upon the previous integrations 
and organization of the mind. Anschauung is really mental 
synthesis, or apperception, and consequently Herbart's doc- 
trine of the Formal Steps is really an elaboration or interpreta- 
tion of Pestalozzi's theory of anschauung. 

Observation is more than the mere staring at or listening 
to things. Not the object itself, even though it be necessary — ■ 
not the historical sequence, even though it be as real as the 
schoolroom walls — but the actual discoverative, inventive, self- 
directed, apperceptive, or synthetic mental activity of the child 
is the essential thing. In the hands of teachers who did not 
understand this central truth, observation became "object les- 
sons," and object lessons became mere imitative, parrot-like 
exercises in naming the properties, qualities, aspects, and rela- 
tions of things. These exercises sometimes amused children, 
but they did not educate them. 

2. EXPERIMENT. 

Observation, even in the sense of anschauung, means that 
the attention is centered upon an object which is static; or, at 
best, upon an object which, though dynamic, is observed as it 
naturally changes. To remedy this defect, the object was made 
to pass through a series of changes, and the original object, the 
forces applied to it, and the object as modified by the forces 
became the unit upon which attention was centered. This con- 
trol of the dynamic aspects of an object for the purpose of ascer- 
taining the effects of controlled forces upon it, is experiment. 
Experiment thus involves a higher reach of mental synthesis 
than is involved in observation. 

In the development of human knowledge, experiment has 
been an efficient method, and very naturally men turned to it 
as an aid in the process of education. AYhen the study of 



78 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

natural science entered the schools, experiment and the labora- 
tory method came in with it, not wholly, but progressively. The 
value of experimentation was so thoroughly believed in that 
definite courses in experiments were arranged and laboratory 
manuals appeared in great abundance. These manuals stated 
the aim of the experiment and gave definite directions as to how 
to proceed from the first step to the last. Thousands of young 
people in secondary schools, academies, and colleges worked 
through these manuals, imitating the directions, getting the 
results, but not doing any genuine, constructive discovery or 
invention. The original value of the experiment, aside from 
its practical and economic aspects, lay in the mental develop- 
ment which the invention of the apparatus and the conditions 
demanded, and in the reflective syntheses implied in the discov- 
ery of the law or principle involved. All this was lost by the 
use of manuals of command and direction. 

In defense of this plan it was argued that the individual 
must know what has been done before he can do any original 
work. If original work means that which no one else has ever 
done before, the claim is perfectly valid. It overlooks, how- 
ever, the very palpable fact that one can do in a thoroughly 
original way what another has already done — that one can 
re-invent, re-discover, and thus have essentially the mental 
experience of the original inventor or discoverer. This re-inven 
tion is no longer invention if one simply follows directions; this 
re-discovery ceases to be discovery if one simply imitates. If 
the ideas of the preceding pages have any validity at all, the 
child should be so conditioned that he re-creates his race in- 
heritance. 

Experimentation under the manual ideal was also so rapid 
that the individual had no time to use the conclusion which he 
reached, as the basis for new apperceptive syntheses. Many 
pupils who have passed rapidly through experiments in heat 
and who have "discovered" the laws of falling bodies, can not 
or do not see that the draft in a chimney and the falling of an 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 79 

apple to the ground are exemplifications of the same law, and 
can not explain the evaporation of water from a dish to which 
no heat has been artificially applied. 

If properly used, however, experimentation offers valuable 
opportunities for genuine mental development, both in the in- 
ventiveness regarding apparatus and procedure needful, and in 
the discoveries and conclusions which result from reflection upon 
the successive steps and results. The research courses of our 
universities are powerful agencies in the development of inde- 
pendent, self-reliant, original thinkers just because the students 
in these courses invent and discover for themselves. The prob- 
lems of university research work are not suited to the capacities 
and interests and needs of children, but the method of attacking 
such problems is "worthy of all acceptation" in the elementary 
school. 

3. REFLECTION. 

The term reflection is often used to indicate the effort of 
pupils to grasp the meaning of definitions and principles which 
they have learned or are learning. In so far as this process is 
anything more than the effort to interpret the words into equiv- 
alent meanings, it is the effort to re-form the indicated syntheses ; 
and this process is, in a way, always imitative. 

The term has another meaning, as in the phrase, reflecting 
on one's experiences. In this sense, reflection is the discovery 
of the deeper import of experience — its ethical meaning. In 
reflection, one's previous experiences are brought (or get) into 
such relations that new meanings are appreciated or discovered. 
Reflection is, therefore, the process by which the hidden meaning 
of experience becomes clear. 

The term is also used as a synonym for original thinking, 
and in this sense it means either purposed discovery or invention. 

In whatever sense the term is used, then, it means nothing 
additional, from the standpoint of actual thinking, to what has 
already been discussed in the preceding sections of this 
chapter. 



80 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 



4. DOING. 



The term doing has long been in use in pedagogical litera- 
ture and has in it the notion of making an idea to be real, and is, 
therefore, simply another term for will in the broadest possible 
sense of that term. What we have called involuntary experi- 
ence, imitation, discovery, invention, self-activity — each has ene 
characteristic of doing, and each implies motor activity. The 
element of motor activity gives one the feeling of emotional 
reality. It should also be conceded that conceptual and aesthetic 
reality are true reals, though they are lacking in the sensa- 
tional element that is characteristic of doing. 

Motor doing is likely to become habit; and habit implies a 
minimum of consciousness. And even this minimum is of the 
passive type. The interpretative control of conventionalized 
symbolism should become habitual, so that one may get at the 
meaning which related symbols express. The pupil should 
think as he attends to symbols, and if the interpretative control 
of symbols be not habitual, this thinking is impossible. The 
habit should result from repetition which springs from interest 
rather than from what are known as "formal drills." 

Much industrial doing also reaches the plane of habit. 
Skill is our name for this kind of habit. Skill is necessary for 
economic efficiency, but it always plays a subordinate role in 
any industry in which there is anything more than a mere me- 
chanical activity. Carpenters in shingling a house, select shin- 
gles "to break the joints," but not by any mere mechanical 
routine. Each man estimates at a glance the most suitable 
width of shingle, and chooses from those at his disposal the 
one best suited to the space that is to be filled. The oppor- 
tunity for this selective activity is what renders carpentry a 
bearable occupation. In fact, the difference between skilled 
and unskilled labor is that one demands more ability to think 
as a person works than the other does. It is perhaps super- 
fluous to say that one must have something in terms of which 
to think before he can think. Habit is, or ought to be, this 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 81 

something in terms of which to think, rather than an uncon- 
scious somewhat, a stock of lumber piled away. 

It has been stated that all doing implies a motor activity 
which gives one the sense of sensational reality. It is believed 
that all other forms of reality depend upon sensational reality 
for their possibility. And, hence, the basis for all valid higher 
thinking rests upon motor experience. The assumption of our 
schools has been that the child before coming to school and 
from day to day outside of school gets enough motor experience 
to give validity to the higher forms of his schoolroom thinking. 
This assumption is not valid for the majority of city children, and 
hence the growth of industrial education in our cities. 

In so far, then, as doing gives an added emphasis to the 
place and value of motor experience, it is a serviceable term in 
educational theory. It should be evident, however, that part 
of the doing should be of each of the types already discussed, 
viz., involuntary, imitative, discoverative, inventive. 

§ 26. THE FORMAL STEPS. 

The terms already used in describing method do not outline 
a specific method of procedure applicable to all school subjects. 
The followers of Herbart, however, believe that there is such a 
uniformity in the movement of the mind in learning and of the 
subject matter which the mind can learn, that it is possible to 
outline a uniform method of procedure in teaching all subjects. 

Briefly put, the argument is thus: — 

(a) The mind interprets every new experience in terms of 
old experiences. 

(6) The mind at first refers its activities to individual ob- 
jects, events, or relationships. 

(c) By comparing individual notions (images?), the mind 
abstracts the common (and therefore necessary) elements and 
synthesizes them into concepts, or principles, or laws. 

(d) The mind thereafter interprets individual objects, 
events, and relationships in terms of existing concepts. 



82 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(e) All subject matter is made up of concepts and individ- 
ual notions. 

(/) The goal of instruction is the mastery and control of 
concepts. 

(g) Therefore, in teaching, one should: — 

1. Prepare the pupil's mind for the interpretation of the 
new by calling up the related old ideas. 

2. Present the new in such a way that it may be readily 
apperceived. 

3. Have pupils compare the new thus gained with similar 
portions of the old and thus discover points of resemblance. 

4. Have pupils synthesize the elements of likeness thus 
discovered into a unity, the concept. 

5. Have pupils apperceive individuals in terms of the, con- 
cepts thus derived. 

The "Five Formal Steps" thus outlined are called, respec- 
tively, Preparation, Presentation, Comparison, Generalization, 
and Application. These steps are held to constitute a uniform 
method of teaching procedure. 

The most patent objection to the method of the formal 
steps is that only a very small portion of the course of study in 
elementary schools is of the conceptual type. The efforts of 
the Herbartians to show that all the subjects of the elementary 
school curriculum are made up of general notions, lacks in con- 
vincingness. 1 While it may be conceded that arithmetic is 
made up of concepts, it can not be conceded that the subject 
should be taught exclusively by the method of the formal steps. 
The older arithmetics were organized on this plan, i.e., the 
logical, conceptual arrangement. According to this old plan, 
the child was supposed to learn all about notation and numera- 
tion before he began addition; and all about addition, subtrac- 
tion, and multiplication before he attempted the mysteries of 
partition and measurement. The most radical improvement 
in the teaching of arithmetic that schools have ever known, not- 

l Method of the Eeoitatinn, Revised edition, pp. 5-12. 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 83 

withstanding the possibilities of formalism in its use, is the spiral 
plan. But the spiral arrangement of material should be modi- 
fied or almost wholly abandoned in the upper grammar grades. 

In geography and history it is impossible to group the 
material into anything approaching concepts. We can secure, 
in these subjects, a series of images that are bound together by 
causal, temporal, spatial, and sometimes logical connection. 
In all the arts, such as writing, spelling, map-drawing, figure 
and sign making, reading, drawing, etc., there is the necessity 
of proceeding from the content or idea to its symbolism by sheer 
contiguity. It is also evident that it is impossible to organize the 
occupational and industrial activities of the school into the con- 
ceptual form. 

The first objection to the formal steps may be stated thus : — 
It is impossible to organize the materials taught in the elemen- 
tary school into the conceptual form demanded for successful 
treatment by the formal steps. 

The method of the formal steps also implies that the chief 
element in mental development is the acquisition of conceptual 
knowledge; or rather, that if this kind of knowledge appears, 
desirable mental development also appears. While in no way 
minimizing the value and importance of conceptual knowledge, 
there is no psychological ground for maintaining that all valua- 
ble mental development must conform to this particular type. 
A mental experience has value not because it conforms to a given 
type or form of mental activity, but because through it there is 
an organization and integration of experiences with a consequent 
changed self and thought of self. The controllable series of 
mental syntheses, which is the essence of all knowledge, is only 
one phase of experience. The elaboration of experience into 
emotional attitudes, into ideals, into conduct is as important 
as is the elaboration of it into conceptual knowledge. 

The theory of the formal steps also ignores the fact that all 
developing experience is spiral, or "circularly progressive." 
One never knows the geography of the Illinois River in any 



84 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

reasonable fullness until he has a mass of post-€chool experi- 
ences. A college course in American History will reveal to one 
how imperfectly he knew even the causes that led up to the 
evacuation of Boston. It is impossible that elementary school 
instruction should have this completeness because the related 
experiences from which this completer meaning comes are not 
appreciated by the child. The theory of the formal steps im- 
plies a kind of completeness which is impossible, and hence, by 
ignoring the spiral character of developing experience, gives 
to teachers a mistaken notion of thoroughness. 

The very patent fact that preparation, presentation, and 
comparison are widely used in teaching is no argument for the 
Formal Steps in their entirety, for the mental activities implied 
in these steps may take place without the activities implied in 
generalization and application. 1 

§ 27. METHODS OF TEACHING AS CORRELATIVE WITH WAYS OF 

LEARNING. 

The conclusion of this whole matter of method of teaching is 
that the method must conform itself to the ways of learning. 
There are many things which one can know about only by 
experiencing them, and with respect to them — provided they 
be worthy things — he is "entitled to his experience." The 
influence of suffering on the development of genuine sympathy 
is clearly recognized. There is a touch, a tone, a coloring of 
mental attitude that can come only through involuntary experi- 
ence, in both child and adult life. Other things can be learned 
only by conscious imitation, and with respect to these the teach- 
ing should be by furnishing copy and awakening desire. Many 
other things the child can discover for himself, and with respect 
to these the child should be so conditioned that he desires to 
find out for himself. Still other things can be invented by the 
child, and with respect to these he should be incited to inven- 

1 King's The Psychology of Child Development, pp. 238-241, lias a different 
criticism of this Herbartian doctrine: also, Dewey's Interest as Belated to Will, 
Second Sup. to Herbart Year Book, 1395, pp. 2J5-243. 



METHOD IN EDUCATION 85 

tion. And finally, there are judgment, insight, sanity, not 
set down in any course of study, and which come only from 
reflection, or self-activity. To develop this self-activity, the 
child should be incited to effort by suggestion and question. 

In all these ways of learning there is (immediately or 
mediately) a response to a stimulus. All may therefore be in- 
cluded under the term "reactive behavior." Arranged in a 
series to show the relatively increasing amount of the use of 
previous organization of the self in the several processes, they 
are : — 

1. Involuntary experience. 

2. Conscious imitation. 

3. Discovery. 

4. Invention. 

5. Self-activity. 

By these processes the child makes his race inheritance his 
own. By these processes he becomes, his self takes on a struc- 
ture and a tendency. If inventiveness, resourcefulness, origi- 
nality, initiative, and self-reliance are valuable traits, they can 
be brought into existence and trained to efficiency by skillful 
teaching. " Necessity is the mother of invention. " If the child 
feels the need of knowledge, if he desires to know, he can invent 
much more effectively than if the necessity is external in the form 
of a system of marks, distinctions, a cross teacher, or a rod. 

What is called method is nothing but the way in which the 
mind acts in developing. From the standpoint of the teacher, 
method is the organization of subject matter (or stimuli) in 
such a way as to produce the greatest possible educative activity 
in the mind of the child. 

In the chapters immediately following, on Discipline and 
The Recitation, we shall deal more concretely with the theory 
of method here advanced, and show more in detail the charac- 
ter of the things which the child may best learn by the several 
ways of learning here sketched. 



CHAPTER VI. 

Discipline, Including School Organization and 
Management. 

The fundamental aim of all education is to secure right 
conduct as a revelation of right character, and, hence, the 
school should seek to go beyond information to what has been 
called formation. The Herbartian idea is that conduct, or char- 
acter is determined by the "circle of thought"; that is, the 
circle of thought determines feelings, and feelings determine 
one's actions. Hence, it is possible to form character through 
instruction. In fact, instruction is the effort to influence, or 
form, or determine character by getting the child to think cer- 
tain things in certain relations. 

§ 28. introduction to the problems of discipline. 

While discipline involves both government and control, it 
is more than either or both of them. There may be government 
and practically no discipline. In and through discipline the 
pupil's conduct is influenced, and ultimately his will is influ- 
enced through his conduct. The idea may be expressed in 
this way: — Instruction forms character by influencing the child's 
intellectual activities; discipline forms character by influencing 
the child's conduct. A disciple is known by his conduct; or, 
his conduct has made a disciple of him; he has been formed or 
disciplined by and through his conduct. 

This view of discipline at once identifies it with teaching, 
and puts an equal value, so far as genuine formative influence 
is concerned, upon both instruction and discipline. It perhaps 
phrases the idea to say that the only concern of the teacher is 
to form thej-eal self of the child in the right way. This is the 



DISCIPLINE 87 

end, and all else is but means. Hence, discipline is a positive 
thing, not a negative one. It is to influence children to do quite 
as much as to influence them to refrain from doing certain 
things. And so discipline may be defined as the organization 
and coordination of all school activities in such a way as most 
effectively to accomplish the ends or purposes of the school. 

This conception of discipline makes it a most difficult task, 
more difficult even than the act of teaching. If you can con- 
ceive of the difficulty of painting a sunset scene with colors 
that constantly change as you apply them, and change so errati- 
cally that you can not tell whether the crimson on your brush 
will turn to brown, blue, or white when dry, you can under- 
stand how difficult discipline really is. No teacher can predict 
with certainty what effect a given punishment will have upon a 
child. Children are not like billiard balls in their reactions and 
movements. The real self is dynamic, not static; and hence 
prediction of the effect of punishment is impossible. 

This fact becomes more obvious when it is remembered 
that the child's sense of self is variable, varying in essential ways 
from childhood to maturity, varying less clearly from year to 
year, less clearly still from day to day, but varying all the time. 
The child's sense of selfhood determines his attitude toward 
any stimulus and also the value of that stimulus to him. And 
again, the problem of school discipline is rendered still more 
difficult by the fact that influences out of harmony with the 
ideal of the school, play upon the child when he is not in school, 
and the teacher is not only not responsible for these influences 
but also, in large measure, powerless to change them. 

Extremely difficult though discipline be, one thing should 
be perfectly clear in the teacher's mind, viz., the aim of disci- 
pline. Many teachers regard discipline as a series of defensive 
acts, designed to keep children from tearing down the school- 
house or from infringing upon one another's rights. To such 
teachers the aim of discipline is "to keep order." But order is 
simply a means to an end. Conformity to the law of things is 



88 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

desirable, but the spirit of conformity is far better, for the spirit 
of conformity means the right attitude toward things while con- 
formity does not include this element. The orderly coming 
into the schoolroom is most valuable when it is done without 
pressure or penalties. The fundamental aim of discipline may 
then be framed as we phrase the aim of education, viz., the 
development of the child into an efficient, ethical, social being. 

The fundamental aim of discipline being clearly appre- 
hended, the next question is this, Is there a fundamental prin- 
ciple of method of discipline? The fundamental principle of 
method of discipline is, one becomes an efficient, ethical, social, 
being only by being an efficient, social, being. More briefly put, 
one becomes by being. 

Psychologists show clearly that (1) an expression is re- 
quired to clinch an impression; (2) the return wave of impres- 
sions from having acted furnishes the basis for our conscious- 
ness of self; (3) feeling, genetically, follows upon activity; (4) 
the will can realize only those movements whose elements have 
already been experienced. 

The new born babe is characterless; it is a mass of possi- 
bilities. Random, reflex, sensory, impulsive, and instinctive 
movements give the first sense of self, a self with a consciousness 
like that of many animals newly born. Then unconscious imi- 
tation of what others do gives a set of feelings which identify 
the child with his fellows. The mere suggestive force of the 
environment produces consciousness but not self-conscious- 
ness. On the basis of the movements thus acquired, conscious 
imitation develops and with it self-consciousness. So strong 
does this idea of conforming to copy become that the individual 
comes to think there is a right external to himself. A parent, a 
teacher, some historical character or mythical personage, some 
book, or some organized view of the world may be the embodiment 
of this right. Or, through self-consciousness and reflection his 
own inner sense of values, his conscience, may be the thing to 
which life is made to conform. Or, conscious of the flux and 



DISCIPLINE SO 

flow of things, one may seek to find the unchanging, the abso- 
lute, the eternal, which is God. 

The essential thing in all this process is that through the 
activity of the individual he is formed. This activity is always 
both physical and mental. A goodness which is mental only, 
which never becomes an "overt act," is unthinkable. All the 
so-called virtues, kindness, forbearance, equivalence, mercy, 
temperance, etc., imply a motor activity. One can become a 
carpenter only by performing the carpenter-activity, a fine 
judge of horses only by judging horses, a musician only by play- 
ing some~musical instrument, honest only by being honest, in- 
dustrious only by being industrious, law-abiding only by being 
law-abiding, etc. ; always and ever the law is that one becomes 
only by being. 

The bad side of this is well known. Loafing on the streets 
has ruined many a boy ; there is no drunkard who does not drink 
to excess, no glutton who does not eat too much, no thief who 
does not steal. Adults are anxious that children shall not 
taste the dregs of life because all this reprehensible activity is 
genuinely formative. One is what he has done; and what one 
shall become is largely determined by what one does now. The 
great fundamental principle is, Reactive conduct forms character. 

But men have not always held the opinions just advanced. 
There are and have been various theories of the moral nature 
of the child, and these theories have a great influence upon the 
discipline administered by those who believe in them. 

(a) The theory of total depravity. 

There have been many people who, in the language of the 
New England Primer, believed that 
"In Adam's fall 
We sinned all." 
The child, therefore, is born into the world depraved, and has 
tendencies toward the bad. The bad in the child is the work of 
the devil. Various methods of casting out devils were used, 
but the most successful method was the causing of physical pain. 



90 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

The rod was the great devil dethroner. The greater pain of the 
child was interpreted as greater devil pertinacity. The more 
innocent forms of fun and play were regarded as works of the 
devil, and were robbed of their attractiveness by having intense 
pain associated with them. In the absence of suitable switches, 
the human hand could slap or cuff the child almost as effec- 
tively as a rod could be used. In schools where vast numbers 
of these incipient devils were collected, Yankee skill and inge- 
nuity soon introduced the ferrule and the "rawhide" whip. 

If one holds to this theory of total depravity, severity is the 
only method by which the natural badness of the child can be 
eradicated. Hence, wherever one finds those who believe in 
this theory, he finds those who are severe in their treatment of 
children. Some even go so far as to maintain that the fact 
that one desires to do a certain thing is sufficient reason for not 
doing it. The only good, according to them, is that pleasure- 
less, colorless kind that comes from doing disagreeable things. 
(b) The theory of innate goodness. 

The inevitable revolt from the doctrine of total depravity 
meant its denial. By emphasis upon this denial the feelings 
of men swung round to the opposite view. Instead of total 
depravity we have innate goodness. Wordsworth says that 
"Trailing clouds of glory do we come 
From God who is our home." 
And coming so direct from heaven, the child is good. He is 
the image of celestial goodness. Therefore the dicta: "Leave 
the child alone!" "If you attempt to interfere, you will spoil 
what God made to be good." 

The defendants of this theory have always been mystics — 
men who thought they were in direct contact with the great 
palpitating heart of the universe. Through this contact they 
learned many things they could not explain. Their only proof 
was iteration. With all adherents of this doctrine the argument 
is: — "Let the child alone. You are already spoiled, but that 
is no reason for spoiling the child. Punishment is pain, and all 



DISCIPLINE 91 

pain is evil. Leave the child alone and he will come out all 
right." 

(c) Theory of evolutionary character. 

With the rise of the scientific idea of evolution, there came 
from many quarters a re-interpretation of ethical theories. 1 If 
recapitulation be true (and its truth is always assumed), then 
each child in his unfolding must pass through all the stages of 
human history. All the appearances of evil are but passing 
stages of development, necessary as is the backward creeping 
of some-infants in their first efforts. Therefore, to punish the 
child for something which he can not help is cruelty. The only 
thing to do is to "possess our souls with patience" until the 
higher stages appear. 

The theory of recapitulation seems valid if stated as ten- 
dency. The tendency becomes an overt act, however, only on 
condition that the environment offer a favorable stimulation- 
Therefore, the evolutionary account of character is valid only 
when the present environment is similar in character to the 
environment of the ancestors. As the conditions of life change 
there is, of necessity, a change from the evolutionary order of 
unfolding. 

Moreover, if the self takes up experience into itself and 
really becomes other than it was before by virtue of its reaction 
to a stimulation, the evolutionary tendencies are constantly 
being modified. The successive and integrated modifications 
thus brought about so greatly change the original tendencies 
that recapitulation is not an accurate description of a human 
being's mental growth. 

(d) The theory of experience and reflection. 

Sympathetic observers of children and students of psychol- 
ogy are generally of the belief that children are neither good nor 
bad at birth ; they are neutral because lacking in that experience 
without which good and bad are meaningless terms Children 

i Recapitulation is the theory that each individual in his development 
passes through all the stages of development through which his ancestors 
passed. 



H H 

1 I 


> 


r 


yf 



92 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

are, at birth, at the zero point of morality. There is, doubtless, 
a genuine hereditary element as racial instincts and also as 
special heredity. All this hereditary endowment, however, 
exists as so much of tendency or possibility. That which alone 
can change tendency or possibility into reality is environment, 
or stimuli of some kind. In this environment of the child there 
are both the good and the bad. Therefore, by his imitation 
of the environment, or by his responses to it, the child becomes 
both good and bad. Good and bad elements are found in each 
person, and the above explanation shows why this is so. 

We can illustrate the 
theory here advanced by a 
diagram. The lines H H 
represent the "heights of 
holiness/' while the lines 
D D represent the "depths 
of depravity." Whether 

the child has tendencies in either direction, in both directions, or 
in none at all, it is clearly seen that he moves toward either holi- 
ness or depravity in consequence of his responses to stimuli that 
play upon him from his social environment. When through ex- 
perience the child has formed a basis for it, reflection enters and 
the child begins to draw conclusions as to what is right, as to 
what is expedient, and as to what is bad. 1 

This theory of experience and reflection explains the genesis 
of moral notions (they arise primarily through experience), 
their development (depending upon the "copy" of the environ- 
ment), and their elaboration into an ethical code (brought about 
by reflection). This theory makes the formation of moral 
character as definite a possibility as is the organization of in- 
telligence through instruction. The teacher can so control 
and order the experience of the child, so stimulate him to reflec- 
tion that the right attitude toward life results. 

The child at first unconsciously conforms to the spirit of 

i Reflection is a form of experience just as truly as is going to a circus. 



DISCIPLINE 93 

the social arid institutional life about him — he yields himself 
to it. Soon, however, in dealing with his playthings, he learns 
that he can make his personal, private ends prevail, and hence 
he uses things (which are perhaps at times thought of by the 
child as persons) merely as means to ends. Adults use inanimate 
things in this way, and they also extend it to animals. These 
personal, private ends are so attractive to the child that he soon 
endeavors to use persons as he. uses things — as mere means to 
ends. 

The child also soon learns that certain social requirements 
are incompatible with his personal ends. He learns by experi- 
ence — sometimes by invention and sometimes by imitation — 
that the penalties for non-conformity to social requirements 
may be evaded by a secret realization of his desires. He there- 
fore gets a motive for cunning semblance of innocence. Pre- 
proclaimed penalties, therefore, foster secret sins, both in the 
home and in the school. 

Again, the child is not witkout plenty of social copy to 
lead him astray in this matter. He learns something of crime 
and of the escape of criminals; he learns some of the conven- 
tional lies of society which are defended on grounds of expe- 
diency too complex for the child to comprehend; and so he 
gradually comes to feel that if the wrong thing be not known 
to others, the wrongdoer is just so much ahead. When he first 
gets this feeling, he is too young and immature to understand 
how these secret sins weave themselves into the woof and warp 
of his life; and when he is mature enough to comprehend this 
great truth, he is usually a slave to the habits he has formed in 
secret. 

To summarize this introduction to the problems of disci- 
pline : 

(1) Discipline is a positive, formative thing. 

(2) The aim of discipline is the formation of right, or 
moral character. 

(3) Reactive conduct forms character ; we become by being. 



94 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(4) By his responses to the suggestions of his environ- 
ment, the child becomes both good and bad. 

(5) The teacher's duty is so to control the child's environ- 
ment that by his responses to it he becomes social and ethical. 

(6) This task is rendered extremely difficult because of 
three things: — 

(a) No one can predict with certainty how a child will 
respond to a given stimulus. 

(b) Influences which the teacher can not control con- 
stantly play upon the child. 

(c) The child's sense of selfhood is a perpetual varia- 
ble. 

§ 29. STAGES OF SELFHOOD IN DEVELOPING CHILDREN. 

There is continuity in the development of the child; a more 
or less of this or that phase of activity, but no abrupt breaks. 
Therefore, the analysis and naming of stages of selfhood is not 
to be understood as an attempt to set off certain time-periods 
in the life of children during which alone certain things are 
true of them. The stages hereafter to be analyzed are over- 
lapping and also variable in intensity and duration in different 
children. The only purpose in this analysis is to reveal a little 
more clearly the reality of the child's expanding life so that, in 
consequence of understanding it better, teachers may more 
effectively deal with pupils. 

1. The child is born into the world with a body consisting 
of related bones, muscles, nerves, nerve-centers, and a mechan- 
ism by which these elements may grow and develop connectedly. 
The connections between these elements are partially established 
at birth. The nerve cells may, without any apparent external 
stimulus at all, send discharges outward so that movement of 
some sort or other results. The movements are (or seem to be) 
aimless, purposeless, variable. The first movements of an in- 
fant's arms and legs appear to be of this character, and are 
therefore called spontaneous movements. We may therefore 
describe spontaneous movements as those which result from an 



DISCIPLINE 95 

accidental, internal discharge of nervous energy which escapes 
now in one way and now in another. Such movements also 
result from an excessive discharge of nervous energy as may be 
seen in almost any person who is under great mental strain. 
Throwing a looking glass from a window and carrying a pillow 
downstairs from a burning building is a concrete case of spon- 
taneous movement. Such movements are, of course, performed 
without any definite, antecedent consciousness, although con- 
sciousness of the movement may follow. 

There is another class of movements closely associated 
with spontaneous movements. The nervous mechanism is so, 
adjusted and organized that if a stimulus of sufficient intensity 
affect a nerve ending, the stimulus travels inward and is re- 
flected back from the nerve cell so that movement results. And 
the movement results before there is any consciousness of the 
stimulus. All such movements are called reflex for the reason 
just given. The contracting of the skin of a snake that has 
been dead some hours sends stimuli inward and responses occur 
till the energy of the central cells is exhausted; and hence the 
belief that a snake, no matter when killed, does not die till sun- 
down, has arisen. The flesh of a turtle which has been dead 
twenty-four hours will twitch and quiver when put in warm 
water or sprinkled with salt. The "flopping" of a beheaded 
chicken is largely of the reflex type, for each time the chicken 
falls upon the ground the stimulus for the next movement is 
given. If one's finger be placed in the open palm of a sleeping 
infant, the latter* s fingers will close because of the mechanism 
of reflex action. Suppose that something comes into contact 
with the fingers or arms of a young child, by reflex action the 
arm will be bent into its pre-natal position. If the fingers 
come into contact with the lips, by another reflex the action of 
sucking is initiated. The complex and delicate nervous mechan- 
ism of the child insures that he will have much experience of 
the reflex type. 

The child has sense organs at birth, and though they are 



96 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

far from perfect, they are excited by the world of stimuli that 
play upon him. This stimulation is inevitably followed by 
movement. These movements from the stimulation of a sense 
organ, however, are widely variable, and hence, while of the 
type of reflex movements, are distinguished from them by their 
variable character; one can predict what reflex movement will 
follow a given stimulus, but not what will follow the stimula- 
tion of a sense organ. The child who has not learned to in- 
hibit incipient movements is at the beck and call of every stimu- 
lus that plays upon him; and this accounts for the apparently 
large amount of non-serviceable bodily movement in children. 
The movement which follows the stimulation of a sense organ 
is called sensory movement. And it would seem that the ex- 
ternal world is an inference from the reactions to stimuli of this 
type. 

Moreover, some psychologists believe that young children 
perform complex movements made up of a series of such simple 
movements as we have been describing, by means of which 
desirable and advantageous ends are secured. The child has 
never experienced the result, and so he can not be said to desire 
it, but he acts as if he knew what the result would be. All 
such acts are called instinctive movements. Commonly cited 
examples are sucking, curiosity, stretching and yawning, etc. 
There is, however, no agreement among psychologists regarding 
this matter of instinctive movement, but if there be such a thing 
at all it must be capable of description by the phrase, pre-?iatal 
habit, or functional correlative of structure. Some say that 
children have more instincts than the young of any other animal, 
and others that children have few, if any, instincts but many 
impulses. Whatever subsequent investigation may prove to 
be the origin of such movements, it is evident that very early in 
the child's life he is able to perform complex movements. 

The value, however, lies not in these separate early move- 
ments, but in the consciousness of movement which they awaken. 
These spontaneous, reflex, sensory, and complex movements 



DISCIPLINE 97 

are the things that awaken the child's consciousness, and that 
equip him with a stock of motor images. Besides a mere stock 
of motor images, the child gets out of these early movements 
a stock of coordinations of sense impressions and equivalent 
motor responses ; he learns what he is to do when certain stimuli 
are present; he gets a glimpse of significance. Also, such motor 
responses are associated with either pleasure or pain, and hence 
the child has a motive to get into contact with the stimulus 
again or else to keep away from such contact. 

It should be noted, also, that the child's instincts (or im- 
pulses towards certain kinds of activity) are transitory, 1 and 
that they give rise to interests. From this it follows that the 
desirable instincts should be conserved by giving them exercise 
and the undesirable ones turned to good by grafting. The 
need of variety in the child's life is also evident, for variety 
alone can succeed in calling out all the desirable instincts in 
the child. 

2. Following closely upon the first stage of the child's 
development is the stage of ideo-motor action. The term sim- 
ply means that the presence of an idea is followed by a move- 
ment. The phrase, unconscious imitation, is also used to des- 
cribe this reality of one's mental life. The clearest illustra- 
tions are of a baby laughing when others laugh (the babe being 
too young to imitate consciously); a child's making the same 
sound over and over again for a considerable time; putting out 
one's foot to prevent a fall when one sees another person about 
to fall; mimicry movements in following a speaker or the plays 
in a game of football. In a young child, the performance of 
an act is immediately a suggestion to perforin it again, and so 
the " circular process" is set up. This circular process seems 
to be nature's way of developing skill in the young. The pres- 
ence of pleasure accompanying the process is assumed, for, if 
pain resulted, the act would be inhibited. The whole matter 
may be summed up by saying that certain of the child's move- 
i James' Briefer Course, p. 402. 



98 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

ments, because of their pleasurable tone, are selected uncon- 
sciously and repeated frequently enough to result in skill. 

3. This second stage soon gives way to a more important 
one, viz., a stage in which ends consciously set up are realized 
in a variety of ways. One evidence of this stage is found in the 
child's games and plays — the child sets up pleasurable ends 
in little nursery games, say with blocks, and performs a series 
of movements for the sake of securing the ends. Another evi- 
dence is found in the child's seeking the approbation of his 
elders. This approbation is pleasurable to him and every 
observer of children knows the resourcefulness and persistence 
of children in their efforts to secure the approbation of those 
they love. Along with this goes conscious imitation, persist- 
ent efforts to realize an end which exists as an objective "copy." 
A child just learning to talk illustrates conscious imitation per- 
fectly. Some new word is needed by the child, and he sets 
about trying to do as others do. Fortunately, such effort is 
usually pleasurable to the child. and so he gains a considerable 
control of symbolism without any consciousness of pain. The 
significance of imitation, however, lies not in the fact of imita- 
tion itself; but rather in the fact that through the imitation of 
what others do he comes to a new thought, or sense of self. Con- 
sciousness of self seems to grow out of conscious imitation. 

4. The child is inevitably praised for his successful imita- 
tions. This, of course, exaggerates his sense of his own import- 
ance. Hence, he desires to gain distinction both with his peers 
and with his elders. Who has not seen a child "showing off" 
for this purpose? The child enjoys showing his power, and 
may even become "pert," "saucy," or "smart." Some chil- 
dren even tell lies to make themselves seem more important and 
powerful than they are. The child's sense of self broadens to 
include his possessions and even the family achievements. A 
small boy said, "Me and my sister have already shot off fifty 
cents' worth of firecrackers." To this another responded, 
"That's nothin'; Bess and me has shot off two dollars and forty 



DISCIPLINE 99 

cents' worth apiece." It is probable that both boys were lying 
because of the love of distinction. In this stage conscious 
imitation is still strong, but it seeks the copy that brings dis- 
tinction. 

Tha one redeeming feature of all this egoistic stage of the 
child's development is that he is willing to seek distinction 
through plays and games that are social in character. The 
child usually likes to be "it" when distinction attaches to the 
position. Still, to gain distinction through games requires a 
subordination of one's self to the rules of the game. This ele- 
ment of social cooperation is the saving element of the child's 
egoism. The "spoiled child" is usually the one who has no 
sense of self as related to others. When children enter school 
one can tell whether they have already learned this lesson of 
subordination of self. 

It should be noted that children differ very much in their 
attitude toward others in this stage of their development. There 
are children who seem content to imitate, to be passive; and 
others who seek to improvise, to invent. The passive ones are 
of the sensory type, and the inventive ones of the motor type. 1 
The motor children are more self-assertive and, consequently, 
become the leaders. Incipient leadership seems to be born at 
this time. 

5. Because of rapid physical growth, or because of some 
painful experience, the child may not be eager to make new 
ventures. He may become self-satisfied. With an environ- 
ment sufficiently stimulating and suggestive, this stage may not 
appear at all, or last but a short time. Repressing children 
who have a tendency to be reticent does them a lasting injury. 
Country children often fall into this self-satisfied stage. Indeed, 
the lack of variety in their environment is a sufficient explana- 
tion of their diffidence and lack of initiative. 

6. With growing motor ability, an increased knowledge of 
what is regarded by others as worth while, and a feeling that 

l Baldwin's Story of the Mind, pp. 166, ff., has a full treatment of these types. 



100 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

one must be responsible for his own career, comes the desire to 
achieve something for one's self, to carve out a destiny, to be- 
come independent. The ordinary routine of schoolroom tasks 
and the simple home duties become distasteful because the 
child does not appreciate their utility. His interests lie with 
and in those things that bring results. The approbation of 
peers, teachers, and parents is valued less highly by the child. 
There is likely to be inward rebellion accompanied either by 
outspoken rebellion or else a listless, lifeless, wooden con- 
formity to requirements. This opposition between interests 
and requirements usually produces a certain shyness, reserve, 
even secrecy and fear. What we call "bent" usually appears 
at this time, and it is only strengthened by the necessity of 
keeping it to one's self. 

Because of the child's already developed motor control, 
because of the rapid growth of his body which renders higher 
forms of control possible, and because of his strong desire to 
produce the useful, the usual school and home duties should 
be supplemented by construction work, domestic science, 
manual training, gardening, and the domestication of animals. 
If the child has nothing in his life which answers to his needs, 
he will become secretive and, possibly, deceitful. 

7. Then there comes a new sense of self as related to 
others — the stage of loyalty to the "gang," or "set," or school. 
This loyalty grows up on the basis of certain desirable ends 
clearly conceived and a real or possible opposition. Without 
being on the team which represents bis school at all, the child 
yells or "roots" without limit. Things which are mean and 
despicable in the opponents are all right for the men of liis team. 
There is a widening and deepening of the sense of self, and the 
feeling of "social solidarity" is born. The child's motto, "Ours 
for success," is not very high ethically, but it is as high as the 
child is fair. This social feeling, however, grows into institu- 
tional spirit, civic interest, and patriotism. 

This stage rests upon a clearly apprehended unity of inter- 



DISCIPLINE 101 

ests, and it is a mistake to attempt to foist upon the child any 
adult interests as bases of social organization. Children have 
their own peculiar and particular interests and resent any domi- 
nating intrusion by adults. 

8. With the rapid physical growth of the period of adoles- 
cence comes a certain indescribable physical lassitude and an 
apparent indifference to many things that formerly aroused 
interest. With this physical growth and functional change, 
strange impulses come to the child. He becomes bashful, not 
simply because of his physical awkwardness, but largely be- 
cause he is not sure how others would regard this strange, new, 
impulsive self within. Consequently, there is a loss of con- 
fidence in others as well as in himself. This drifting continues 
for a year or two, becoming habitual with some, and giving place 
to a certain peevishness, narrowness, or fickleness in others. In 
most children some feeling for those of the opposite sex is 
awakened, and around this feeling cluster most of their social 
activities. Love-games have lasted so many centuries because 
they afford an opportunity both to express and to conceal one's 
real feelings. 1 

It is quite impossible to determine in advance what a child 
will be at the end of this period of adolescence. Some boys who 
have always been gentlemanly up to this time become "toughs," 
and some girls who have been models of propriety become 
"rowdies." The reverse is also true. This period is perhaps 
the most critical, in its final outcome, of all the stages here im- 
perfectly sketched. Usually by the time a boy or girl is seven- 
teen or eighteen years old, his or her generic attitude toward life 
is pretty well formed and revealed in his or her conduct and 
accepted ideals; but what attitude one has at twelve years of. age 
is no such guide to the future. 

This imperfect sketch of the stages of development of the 
sense of selfhood in children shows that the same sort of school 
organization and of studies will not be equally effective with 

l Pedagogical Seminary, Vol. V. p. 6L ff. has a study of Adolescence. 



102 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

pupils ot all ages. In fact, not what is set up in the way of a 
course of study, not what ideals of conduct are held before the 
child, but how the child responds to the stimulus is the thing that 
determines the educative efficiency of our efforts. With this 
knowledge of the child who is to become civilized and socialized 
by' discipline clearly in mind, the matter of the organization 
and management of the school may be taken up. 

§ 30. ORGANIZATION AND MANAGEMENT. 

The meaning of these two terms, organization and manage- 
ment, needs to become clear. Without attempting any deriva- 
tive meaning, and attempting only a descriptive definition, it 
may be said: 

(1) To organize a school is so to relate and coordinate the 
various elements necessary to make up a school that they work 
together harmoniously, effectively. 

(2) To manage a school is to make the organization 
real. 

Organization and management are in reality but one, and 
will be so considered, for planning without execution is but 
dreaming, and executing without planning is foolhardiness. 

The various things necessary to make up a school are pupils, 
parents, teachers, books and apparatus, heat, light, fresh air, a 
schedule of study and of recitation. The problem of organiza- 
tion is so to coordinate these various elements that by and 
through the coordination effected the end of education may be 
progressively realized. 

I. The mechanical phases of school organization. 

There are certain mechanical phases of organization that 
demand attention because of their relation to the mental activ- 
ity of the child. 

(a) The pupils should be so seated that the work of sepa- 
rate classes shall interfere as little as possible. And the separate 
seats should be of such a character that no unnecessary fatigue, 
or strain, or curves of the spine may interfere with the activity 
of the child's attention. It is possible, of course, to have a good 



DISCIPLINE 1 03 

school with rude slab benches, but the less attention a child is 
forced to pay to splinters the more he may give to letters. 

(6) -The lighting of the schoolroom is of importance only 
as the proper intensity and direction of the light is an aid to easy 
visual discrimination. The least strain in visual discrimination 
means greatest power of attention to the thought relations in- 
volved. 

(c) So, too, in heating a schoolroom ; the aim is to maintain 
that temperature which is neutral to the child, so that he does 
not notice the temperature at all. This of itself is an easy matter, 
but it becomes difficult because of its connection with ventilation. 

(d) Fresh air is necessary to the proper activity and, con- 
sequently, feeling of the body. The impurities in the exhaled 
breath are the things that dull and diminish the activity of the 
body and the brain. To get plenty of fresh air into a room is 
easy enough ; but to get it of the proper temperature and without 
a draft is difficult. Ventilation is a separate problem for each 
school building and for each schoolroom. 

(e) The program must have reference both to study and to 
recitation periods. The great desideratum in making a program 
is to arrange it so that the work to be done may be done with 
least effort and least loss of time. Since fatigue is a fact that 
cannot be escaped, the laws relating to it are important in their 
bearing upon program making. First, fatigue is contagious. If 
one expresses the feeling of fatigue, this expression is a strong 
suggestion of the feeling to the one who sees it. Second, any 
painful emotion or activity readily produces fatigue while any 
pleasurable activity or emotion produces a sense of power, or 
buoyancy. The reason for this is that pain is, in general, an 
indication that something is interfering with the advancement 
of the physical or mental life, and pleasure is the concomitant 
of that which makes for the advancement of the physical or 
mental life. Third, the loss of intellectual power due to fatigue 
follows a certain order, viz., abstract reasoning, imagination, 
memory, perception, sensation. Hence, those studies which 



104 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

deal with perception may be carried on when others dealing with 
abstract or conceptual relations could not be done with profit. 

Besides the laws of fatigue, one must consider, in making a 
program, the age and ability of the pupils, the character of the 
subjects, and the work that must be accomplished in a given 
time. 

The purpose in setting forth these mechanical phases is not 
to make a manual, not to set forth the best make of school desk, 
or the best plan for admitting light to schoolrooms, or the 
best method of heating and ventilating a building. Rather, the 
purpose is to set forth the ideal with respect to these mechanical 
things, to give the reason for attention to them, to show how 
they are factors in the schoolrooom education of the child, and, 
especially, to indicate how they may become factors in the problem 
of school discipline. 

II. The spiritual phases of school organization. 

By the spiritual phases of school organization is meant those 
things which appeal directly to the child's mind, which are direct 
suggestions to mental activity. Chief among these spiritual 
things are the course of study, the personal influence of the 
teacher, cooperation in various forms, and the decoration of 
the schoolroom and yard. 

A. The course of study. 

1. The course of study stands as the chief among all those 
forces which are direct suggestions to the mental activity of 
children. It stands as the one central means by which the aim 
of education is realized by and through the agency of the school. 
A course of study indicates what ideas the community believes 
its youth should acquire. Therefore, the course of study has 
changed from an exclusive study of the catechism to the complex 
thing it is to-day. The great danger is that the course of study 
will become habitual, static, instead of being dynamic, adapt- 
ive. Social habit may lead to arrested development just as 
truly as individual habit may; but be it a blind clinging to the 
past or abreast of modern needs, the course of study still unmis- 



DISCIPLINE 105 

takably indicates what the community holds best for its youth 
to know. 

2. If, now, the course of study be analyzed the subjects 
involved in it will appear. First of all, there are those studies 
which deal with the means by which men communicate with 
each other, such as oral language and written language. These 
in turn imply reading, writing, spelling, drawing, and pronuncia- 
tion. Second, those studies which have to do with social adjust- 
ments, such as industry in its various forms, history, geography, 
civics, literature. Geography shows how men adjust them- 
selves to natural forces and to each other; civics, how the gov- 
ernmental phases of social or group adjustment have been and are 
maintained; history, how men have adjusted themselves to nat- 
ural forces, to exchange, to friendly and hostile groups, and to 
ideals; literature, how men might have adjusted themselves to 
various things; industry, how men adapt themselves to natural 
forces in production, to each other's needs in transportation, and 
to the demands of equivalence in exchange. Third, there are 
studies that deal with the adjustments of natural things to each 
other and with our human interpretations of such adjustments 
— what we call nature study and science. 

3. It is easy, therefore, to trace out the reasons for teaching 
each subject in terms of its socializing influence. Nature study 
equips the child with a set of interpretations regarding natural 
phenomena, interpretations that assist him in more clearly com- 
prehending the utility and beauty of nature, that render his life 
fuller and richer. Punctuation socializes the child in two ways, 
viz., by giving him a ready power of interpreting the thought 
relations of the sentences he reads, and by equipping him with 
control of a conventionalized symbolism by which he can more 
clearly and effectively communicate his thoughts to others in writ- 
ing. Geography socializes the child by teaching him how others 
adapt themselves to natural conditions to make a living, and to 
each other so that they live. The higher reaches of geography 
(physical geography and geology) constitute a natural science 



106 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

for they deal with natural things and forces which may be treated 
without reference to human interests. Such geography, how- 
ever, has little place in the grades of the elementary school. 

4. It should now be evident that every group change of in- 
dustry, of social relationship, or of ideal demands some change 
in the course of study. Every change, in fact, may be explained 
as due to social pressure. Those changes which are transient, 
which do not answer to a fundamental social need are the "fads" 
of the school. These fads may be given a place by the influence 
of teachers whose judgment has been warped by long brooding 
or by undue readiness to copy the work of others, or by the in- 
fluence of some social organization whose purposes are good but 
whose "vision of the whole" has been blurred by unbalanced 
enthusiasm. Ultimately, and without fail, the course of study 
conforms itself to the social ideal; and since this ideal changes, 
the course of study must also change. These changes in social 
ideal are gradual because the conservative element makes them 
so, and the corresponding school changes should be gradual also. 

5. But granting that the content of the course of study is 
and must be a reflection of the social consciousness, the arrange- 
ment of it — its order — is usually left to the school. This order 
is not indifferent to the child. It should have an element of 
progressive continuity about it so that what the child has already 
learned may be the apperceptive basis for the learning of the 
new. Not separate subjects, but phases of one subject is the 
ideal' arrangement of a course of study. This means that the 
course of study shall be broken up into a series of related unities 
so that the order in which knowledge is learned may be a sug- 
gestion to its unification or systematization. 

This order, moreover, should conform to interest. Interest 
is simply the desire to know, the feeling of finding in an object 
something which satisfies one, a something that has worth for 
one, a clearly felt value. One can not rely in school instruction 
wholly upon the extra-schoolroom interests of the child. His 
interests in games, in natural things, and in social situations are 



DISCIPLINE 107 

not sufficient to carry him through the studies of the school. But 
it is possible to awaken interests, to suggest things to the child, 
to awaken needs in him. In short, it should be the teacher's 
constant effort to connect what he teaches with the already 
established interests of the child, and also to lead the child to con- 
nect what he learns with the manifold present and prospective 
extra-schoolroom affairs. The possibility of doing the things just 
mentioned rests upon the law of the spreading of interests, which 
is, "Uninteresting things become interesting by being brought 
into real relations with things already interesting." Always and 
everywhere, the uninteresting becomes interesting by being 
brought into vital relations with existing interests. The de- 
mands of this very important truth upon the order of the course 
of study are obvious enough. 

6. But there is a more fundamental consideration involved 
in this matter of the administration of the course of study. Plow 
should the course of study be regarded, as so much knowledge 
to be learned or as so much opportunity for constructive think- 
ing? What is the end, information or formation? The an- 
swers to these questions lay bare the basal fact of the course of 
study. The course of study exists not as a mold by means of 
which products of one common pattern may be turned out with 
regularity and applause. Rather, it exists as so much of oppor- 
tunity for development for each child. Each child, by solving 
the problems presented by the course of study, by learning the 
facts, by reflecting upon the meanings of the facts transforms 
himself from the child into the man. The course of study 
should, therefore, be regarded as so much of opportunity for 
constructive thinking by means of which each child shall become 
genuinely socialized. 

B. The personal influence of the teacher. 

The course of study is vitalized and becomes this oppor- 
tunity for socialization only through the mediation of the teacher. 
If the clay be ever so good and the potter a poor workman, the 
product will be poor. Better a good workman and poor clay 



108 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

than the reverse. And so, after all is said about the significance 
and ideal purposes of the course of study, the teacher is the 
medium by which the course reaches the child's mind. 

1. It should be noted, in the first place, that, in all elemen- 
tary education especially, the unconscious influence of the teacher 
is very great. Since this is true, the teacher should be funda- 
mentally true and noble. Being a saint in the schoolroom and 
a sinner outside is an impossibility. Skill in questioning and 
suggestion avail much, but they are of the highest efficiency only 
when they are added to a character that is worthy. The laws 
which demand that a teacher be a person of good moral char- 
acter are an evidence of a certain level of social consciousness and 
of a social appreciation of the claim here urged. 

2. The direct, conscious influence of the teacher is also last- 
ing. Every adult can look back over his school days to some 
event in which the conscious personal influence of some teacher 
became an incentive to good or bad conduct. The peculiar 
thing about this is that the teacher cannot tell what action or 
word of his will become this transforming agency in the pupil's 
life. Hence, the necessity that all the conscious activities of the 
teacher be of a kind that makes for character. 

3. It is desirable, therefore, that the teacher have self-con- 
trol developed to a remarkable degree. Schoolroom situations 
frequently have such a degree of intensity as to excite strong 
emotions. The teacher who yields to these sudden tides of feel- 
ing not only sets objectionable copy for the pupils, but also 
lowers himself in their estimation. Aside from the reasons just 
given, every teacher needs self-control for the sake of saving his 
own power and vitality. And, finally, leaving all low utilities 
out of account, self-control is worth while just for its reflex in- 
fluence on one's character. 

4. This self-control, however, does not mean either cyni- 
cism or stoicism; and it is not at all incompatible with sympathy. 
A minister once said that the devil had most of the world's good 
music in his service. It ought not to be so, nor should it be true 



DISCIPLINE 109 

that we have sympathy only for those in pain or misfortune. One 
should feel with (sympathize) those who have pleasures as well 
as with those in pain. To sympathize is to enter freely into the 
related mental activity series of another. To do this, one does 
not have to become either violent or insane. A look, a pressure 
of the hand, a word — any one of these will suffice. And the 
teacher who can thus unreservedly and freely enter into the lives 
of his pupils grapples them to him "with hooks of steel." With- 
out sympathy on the part of the teacher, a schoolroom is a sort 
of prison house. 

5. The teacher should also have insight, as this is opposed 
to book knowledge. Insight means an appreciation of the signif- 
icance of particular things as related to the totality of things — it 
means sense. The teacher who has his pupils read every lesson 
in the book just because it is there, or solve all the problems in a 
list simply to keep the pupils busy, or so that he may say that 
his pupils solved every problem in the book, lacks insight. In 
view of what has been said above regarding the course of study, 
we may say that insight is that which enables a teacher so to 
correlate the daily work and so to interest pupils in it that the 
maximum educative effect for each child results. Insight inter- 
prets the formal requirements of the course of study in terms of 
educative possibility, and realizes that though "the letter killeth, 
the spirit giveth life." Insight also means that the teacher un- 
derstands the needs and inclinations of children. 

6. Along with these fine qualities and attainments should 
go a plain and unheralded honesty. Honesty is demanded not 
only in the realm of social contact and in reports concerning 
natural things, but also in the realm of the intellectual. Many 
times children ask questions which the teacher is unable to 
answer. A fear of falling in the estimation of the child has led 
many a teacher into dishonesty. The confession of ignorance is 
simple, intellectual honesty. Of course, the child may lose his 
respect for a teacher who does not know some simple little fact 
which the child has known for years. This is regrettable, in- 



110 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

deed; but the effect of intellectual dishonesty is even worse for 
both the teacher and the child. One's sins have a way of find- 
ing one out; they grow to such proportions as to topple over. 
And hence, plain, unheralded honesty is necessary to the best 
personal influence of the teacher. 

7. The personal qualities already set forth also imply the 
virtues of consistency and evenness of temper. Consistency 
means the making of life to be a whole that is without contra- 
dictions. Evenness of temper means that one so controls him- 
self that the passing, shifting impulses are inhibited. If there 
be in the teacher the qualities already enumerated, there will 
also be the element of justice, not the justice of mere rule, not 
that which is constrained or forced by some previously uttered 
standard, but the justice that seeks the real reformation of the 
offender. 

C. Cooperation in various forms. 

Having seen the function of the course of study and of the 
personal influence of the teacher in the formation or develop- 
ment of the child, the influence of the various forms of 
cooperation upon this development should be considered. If 
the fundamental principle of discipline be correct, as al- 
ready stated, one can become cooperative only by being 
cooperative. 

1. The activity of cooperation arises in the child's games 
and plays. Leadership arises from such cooperation, and also 
bullying and dominance. Nevertheless, the games and plays of 
children of elementary school age are perhaps the most impor- 
tant and distinctive elements of their training in cooperation. 
Therefore, the games pupils play both in and out of school are 
vital factors in determining both their present and future social 
attitudes. The supervision of games is imperative. This super- 
vision, however, should be of the sympathetic — not the dictato- 
rial — sort. Whenever possible, the teacher's participation in the 
school games is desirable, both because of the knowledge he gets 
of the motives to which the pupils respond, and because of the 



DISCIPLINE 111 

influence - 'the teacher's participation has upon the pupils' ideals 
of play. 

2. Over and beyond this seemingly natural cooperation of 
pupils in plays and games, there is a wide field of possible co- 
operation which the teacher can suggest. Blackboards, erasers, 
floors, desks — all need to be kept clean and orderly. If this can 
be brought about by cooperative effort, the growth in the spirit 
cf cooperation is added to the utility of habits of cleanliness 
and orderliness. Let one group look after the erasers for a 
week; another group, the desks, etc. But all these things should 
be done with the idea of keeping the school orderly and clean, 
and not with the idea of fault-finding and carping criticism. 

3. Closely associated with these activities are those in which 
the whole school participates, such as marching, drills, calis- 
thenic exercises, etc. In these activities of the whole school, it 
is much better if they are performed from a sense of pride in and 
for the school than if they are performed because they are com- 
manded. 

4. Then, too, if pupils can be encouraged to bring books, 
maps, pictures, relics, specimens, etc., from their homes for 
temporary school use, there arises a feeling of genuine coopera- 
tion. Many teachers are blind to these opportunities for build- 
ing up both a school spirit and a community spirit favorable to 
the school. A school can be too completely equipped, for the 
things that come without effort are often lacking in power to 
arouse interest and to hold the attention. 

Underlying all that has been said in this section on school 
cooperation is the sociological theory that consciousness of 
others and regard for others are possible only through participa- 
tion. This theory may be again illustrated by the consideration 
of another topic. 

D. Decoration of the schoolroom and school grounds. 

No one can deny the value of appreciation and love of art. 
The recent revival of the study of art has had a beneficent influ- 
ence upon education, for our schools were placing too great stress 



112 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

upon the development of the intellectual activities of the mind 
to the neglect of the emotions. Since most of the teachers then 
teaching were untrained in art, the subject came into our schools 
in a formal way. The contemplation of works of art (no, of 
cheap reproductions of great art) became the prevailing method 
in our elementary schools. The drawing of geometrical figures 
from book copy failed to develop a genuine appreciation of art 
or to prepare the child for anything else. No one would be- 
little the unconscious influence of art upon children, but we 
should rise above this in our instruction. 

People used to build parlors and furnish them with up- 
holstered furniture, lace curtains, and meaningless pictures in 
gilt frames. This custom is happily passing away, but it had 
and has its counterpart in the decoration of many schoolrooms. 
The idea was that all the selection of pictures and actual decora- 
tion of the schoolroom should be done once and for the whole 
year by the teacher; and that pupils, by gazing, would have their 
"art impulse" sufficiently developed. 

1. The decoration of a schoolroom should be a dynamic, 
not a static thing. The ideal is not to decorate a schoolroom 
as a home would be decorated, for the purpose is very different. 
In one case the decoration is for the gratification of established 
ideals of the beautiful ; in the other, the formation of such ideals. 
The static arrangement of things may satisfy, but it cannot pro- 
duce the aesthetic ideal. Seasonal changes demand attention in 
the decoration of schoolrooms, and so do the special days and 
celebrations observed by the school. To make portraits of 
national heroes or pictures of historic scenes a constant in school- 
room decoration is to make them unnoticed. 

2. Whatever the material used for decoration may be, a 
little reflection will make it clear that pupils should participate 
in the arrangement of it. Suppose that a teacher, with a con- 
siderable effort, has a room already decorated when school opens, 
and that the children feel that it is beautiful. Will this feeling 
last, or will it soon become unconscious ? Suppose, on the other 



DISCIPLINE 113 

hand, that the walls are bare on the opening day, and that the 
school takes an inventory of the pictures, selects the best place 
for each, and assists in the grouping and spacing of the decora- 
tions. Grant, also, that the arrangement in the second case is 
less in accord with the aesthetic judgment of experts. Which 
plan will give the most genuine art education? 

The answer is to be found in the following truths: 

Passive impressions decrease in vividness with repetition. 

Active impressions increase in vividness with repetition. 

These two principles have a wider application in education 
than is here given them, but their bearing on the problem of 
schoolroom decoration is obvious. 

Another principle of significance in this connection is, "That 
which produces an appreciative or significant response is more 
educative than that which produces a formal response." The 
validity of this principle is evident when we consider how in- 
significant most pictures of the Madonna type really are to chil- 
dren. The Romanticism which produced the Madonna in art 
is foreign to the child in the lower grades. 1 

3. Including suitability and harmony in the art feeling, it 
is evident that the care of the yard and buildings by the children 
is a positive element in their training. It is well, if the trees are 
not all planted, if the flowers are not all furnished from a green- 
house. It is well to leave something for the children to do. The 
genuine appreciation of the beauty of flowers and trees cannot 
exist independent of some motor activity in connection with 
them. An interest in elms springing from planting one at school, 
may spread to include many other trees, but one cannot say that 
this interest would have arisen without some motor experience. 
And, too, since this is largely a matter of ideals, it should be 
evident that some real basis for the ideal must exist. 

4. Much of what has been said applies to school gardens 
and flowers. The motor basis of genuine interest in these 
things is too evident, in light of what has been said, to need 

i De Garmo, in N. E. A. Proceedings, 1901, p. 519 ff. 



114 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

further argument. The school garden is not wholly for aesthetic 
ends — it should develop practical interests as well. Now, if 
this be the object, there should be the usual varieties of garden 
vegetables and some of the newer ones, also. A garden that 
has new varieties of vegetables in it will attract considerable 
attention because of the novelty. The school garden should not 
run to the quaint and the curious, but it is quite possible that 
interest in Brussels sprouts may awaken interest in some com- 
moner things by the law of spreading interests or by the com- 
parisons the child may be led to make. 

Further, the things most desirable for a school garden are 
those that grow fast enough to attract attention. Some change 
in the object is necessary to interest, and the present allotment of 
school time in the year is a further reason for the selection of 
rapidly growing plants. 

5. Many teachers overlook the fact that flowers, grains, 
leaves, etc., may be used to good advantage in decoration. The 
feeling against them is due to the fact that they have frequently 
been kept so long that they have become "mussy." This is due 
to a certain laziness which leaves a thing where it has once been 
placed till its removal becomes an imperative necessity. Co- 
operative work should secure and arrange such material, and 
see to its removal and renewal. 

6. The work of the pupils is often used for exhibitive pur- 
poses, and may occasionally be used for decorative purposes. 
Such work can never replace works of art, but it can be used as 
a basis for developing a sense of harmony, suitability, and 
balance. 

In this whole section on the spiritual phases of school organ- 
ization, an effort has been made to show that the course of study, 
the personal influence of the teacher, and the decoration of the 
schoolroom and school yard are a unity in being that which 
directly stimulates the mental activity of children; and, further, 
in so far as children actively enter into these various things, they 
are thereby directly disciplined in a right way. 



CHAPTER VII. 

Discipline, Including School Organization and Man- 
agement (Concluded) . 

The place and value of the mechanical aspects of school 
organization and management, and the relation of the spiritual 
influences of the school to the child's growth have been exam- 
ined in detail. The broader aspects of these things are now 
to be considered. 

III. The social relationships involved. 

Since the school is both an expression of the social con- 
sciousness and a thing that reacts upon social consciousness, 
there are two kinds of social relationships involved in a school, 
viz., those that have reached the plane of social habit, or law, 
and those that have not done so, and perhaps never will become 
matters of definite social formulation. The legal limitations 
vary from state to state, and with these the teacher should be- 
come familiar. A few general remarks, however, upon the 
spirit of these legal requirements may not be amiss. 

(A) Legal relationships of the school. 

1. The phrase, in loco parentis, which is used to describe 
the relation of the teacher to the pupils, is extremely significant, 
and shows clearly that society recognizes in the school an institu- 
tion which should do for the children what the parents would do 
if they could. In general, this phrase defines the authority of 
the teacher and also the force he may use in maintaining this 
authority. This authority is the same as that which any parent 
has over his child, and a teacher, unless there be some special 
legal limitation, may use the same force that a parent may use 
in securing obedience. But the phrase also carries with it the 



116 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

idea that the teacher should have the same loving, sympathetic 
interest in the child's welfare that the parent has. 

2. This same idea is involved in the matter of suspension 
and expulsion. The power of suspension rests with the teacher, 
but expulsion rests with the school board or school trustees. 
This provision removes any possibility of personal anger from 
the decision of a matter of such importance. Suspension should 
be the last resort of the teacher, for it practically means that 
cither the pupil or the teacher must leave the school unless some 
mediating agency be found. 

3. So, too, the purchase of supplies is wisely left in the hands 
of those who are elected by the people and are responsible to 
them. It is the teacher's business to keep the board informed 
as to the needs of the school, but not to buy the needed things 
except on orders from the proper authorities. 

4. Certain studies are prescribed by either state or local 
law. The teacher should see to it that these legal requirements 
are kept. If it is desired to introduce a new requirement into 
the course of study, the sanction of the school authorities should 
be secured in advance of any definite demands upon the pupils. 
The advisability of requirements may be discussed with the 
school board freely, but the teacher should assume no authority 
with regard either to the setting up or the evading of require- 
ments of this character. 

5. Then there is the matter of compulsory attendance with 
its advantages and disadvantages, and the teacher has certain 
duties with respect to it. These duties generally consist in sim- 
ply reporting the absentees to the proper officer. If the teacher 
does more than this, either in talking about the delinquents or 
in executing the law, there will probably be some ill-feeling 
aroused. The responsibility for the enforcement of all com- 
pulsory attendance laws rests with the school authorities and not 
with the teacher. This should not be understood to imply that 
the teacher has no duty toward delinquents beyond the one set 
down in the law. But officiousness, tactless nagging, and 
blustering, are always harmful. 



DISCIPLINE 117 

6. Finally, there is the matter of keeping the records of 
attendance, of progress in studies, etc. These records are im- 
portant because of their relations to other things, and not in and 
of themselves. The tendency to put such things off till a more 
convenient season is fatal both to the records and to the teacher. 

These remarks are introduced in order to set forth those 
essential legal aspects of the school which have most to do with 
its orderly conduct, and are not designed to serve as a substitute 
for that closer knowledge of school law which every teacher 
should have. 

(B) Extra-legai relationships of the school. 

1. The individual school is always a community interest. 
The pupils themselves directly connect the school with most of 
the homes of the community. They also give reports of the 
events that occur in school. Whether one wishes it or not, the 
teacher is in an organic relation to the community. For every 
social relation there is a correlative duty. The duty as regards 
the community life is participation, not criticism. The teacher 
should be "a means of grace" to the community. The com- 
munity may have crude ideals, and while the teacher should feel 
his superiority to these ideals, he should not feel himself superior 
to those who have these ideals. Cynicism is almost natural to 
teachers who deal constantly with immature pupils. The habit 
of correcting faults in children and of telling them of their mis- 
takes is indefensible when it is applied to the community. Co- 
operative betterment of the community and of its ideals is the 
"plain duty" of the teacher. 

2. Moreover, the teacher's duty to the community as a 
whole is paralleled by his duty to visit parents and to confer with 
them about their children. This becomes progressively more 
and more difficult as we pass from rural districts to cities, and 
its desirability becomes progressively greater with its increasing 
difficulty. The reason for this duty is found in the essential 
unity of the aim of the home and of the school. Very naturally 



118 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

children report the unusual rather than the usual school events, 
and so the parents are usually inclined to discuss the disorderly 
pupils of the school when the teacher calls. If the teacher yields 
to this temptation, his visit is worse than useless. Proper sub- 
jects for conversation are the child's health and disposition, his 
attitude toward school work and school associates, his home 
occupations, recreations, etc. These are the matters of common 
interest and are also the valuable things for both the parent and 
the teacher to know about. 

Another great temptation is that of being agreeable rather 
than truthful. And there is a difference between being truthful 
and being brutal. Sincerity names, better than any other word, 
the attitude the teacher should have toward the parents of his 
pupils. Teachers have not always been above reproach in re- 
gard to this matter. Our conventional phrases are all am- 
biguous. Some teachers who say, "Sarah is getting along 
pretty well," mean, "Sarah is getting along pretty well — for such 
a stupid creature as Sarah is." Teachers should, both mean 
what they say and say what they mean. 

3. Patrons are related to the school and therefore have cor- 
relative duties. Chief among these duties are those of visiting 
the school frequently enough to know what the school is trying 
to do, of manifesting an interest in the work, and of being loyal 
to the teacher as long as he is worthy of loyalty. Patrons seek 
to excuse themselves for the non-performance of these duties by 
citing either their own home cares or the division of labor, which 
means that they regard the school as a separate institution. 
Sometimes, however, there is among patrons a sense of not com- 
prehending the work of the school, or of being ill at ease because 
of not knowing just what to do when there. The latter can be 
overcome by a tactful teacher through the visits discussed above. 
The former can be removed by patrons' and mothers' meetings 
(discussed below). The teacher should not lecture the com- 
munity on its duties to the school, but should be tactful in arous- 
ing a sense of this duty. 



DISCIPLINE 119 

4. The initiative in bringing about this desirable community 
interest in the school rests primarily with the teacher. How- 
ever clearly teachers may see that the community should assume 
the initiative, they should see equally clearly that the community 
seldom does take the initiative. Therefore, the teacher should 
plan to have the school entertain the patrons. These patrons' 
meetings should consist of exhibitions of regular class work — 
not show recitations; of entertainment of various kinds, from 
separate recitations, or "pieces," to a light luncheon served by 
the children; of discussions of topics of common interest. By 
means of these meetings the patrons get a new view of the teacher, 
a keener sense of the actual difficulties of the schoolroom, a 
broader vision of what the school is trying to do. Such meetings 
not only destroy distrust but develop the cooperative spirit as 
well. These meetings in no way serve as a substitute for the 
visitation of the school by the patrons, but they sanely pave the 
way for such visits. 

5. Implicit in all that has been said regarding the social 
relationships of the school is the idea that it is necessary for the 
teacher to be broad-minded, tactful, slow to anger, and skilled 
in healing wounds. Teachers should be broad-minded so that 
they may not be misled by the petty; tactful, so that they may 
achieve their ends and yet save their own energy — win by diplom- 
acy rather than war; slow to anger, that they may be reflective 
rather than impulsive; skilled in healing wounds, that the dam- 
aging effects of misunderstandings may be minimized. Besides 
the ability to teach, the teacher should have the qualities of a 
minister and of an honorable politician. 

IV. The conduct phases. 
Having discussed the mechanical, spiritual, and social phases 
of school organization in their relation to the effective work of the 
school, the conduct phases demand particular consideration. 
Conduct is a broad term including all of one's actions towards 
persons and things. It includes the good and the bad, the im- 
pulsive and the consciously chosen, the trivial and the significant, 



120 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the transient and the permanent. Each teacher should reflect 
on what the conduct of the pupils should be, so that his ideals 
may become definite enough to be serviceable. The very lack 
of a standard of what conduct should be is responsible for 
much of the ill-success in managing schools. There are also 
false ideals of order. Some people think that order involves 
quiet of the hear-a-pin-drop variety, and at times order does 
involve this. Order, however, is the effective doing of what 
needs to be done. To bring the matter clearly before the 
reader, the following outline is introduced: — 
A. What should the conduct of pupils be? 

(a) Outside the schoolroom: — 

(???) To and from school. 

(??) On the playground. 

(o) Getting into and out of the building. 

(b) Within the schoolroom: — 

(p) Toward the teacher. 
(q) Toward each other. 

(r) Toward the materials used in school, such 

as desks, books, papers, pencils, ink, maps, globes, 

pictures, casts, floors, blackboards, crayons, erasers, etc. 

(s) Toward study and exercises assigned by the 

teacher. 

(7) Toward the recitation. 

Anyone who thinks about this matter will see that it is easy 

to state the ideal negatively — that pupils should not do certain 

things under the conditions mentioned. This negative phrasing of 

the ideal is not sufficient, and so a positive phrasing follows: — 

(m) To and from school, pupils should engage in 

friendly conversation and games that do not cause delay or 

damage. 

(n) On the playground, pupils should engage in games 
that afford exercise, that demand cooperation and skill, and 
that afford the least opportunity for trickery and fraud ; and 
in a frank, open, and sincere manner. 



DISCIPLINE 121 

(o) Getting into and out of the building, pupils should 
cooperate in keeping the line and in moving rapidly. 

(p) Toward the teacher, the pupils should be respect- 
ful, obedient, and courteous. 

(q) Toward each other, pupils should be sociable, 
cooperative, kindly, polite. 

(r) Toward the material used in the schoolroom, pupils 
should be careful and considerate. 

(s) Toward study and exercises assigned by the teacher, 
pupils should be diligent, faithful, conscientious, and should 
work independently. 

(t) Toward the recitation, pupils should be attentive, 
courteous, willing to respond, fair. 
B. Prevalent school offenses. 

With this outline of pupil-situations clearly before us, it is 
easy to indicate and group the prevalent offenses against the 
order of the school. Following the outline just given: — 

(m) To and from school: — loitering, annoying resi- 
dents and travellers in various ways, stealing from farms 
or stores, torturing animals, quarreling, hectoring, fighting, 
and smoking. 

(n) On the playground : — annoying persons who pass by 
throwing things at them or by being saucy, hectoring, bully- 
ing, fighting, quarreling, hurting each other intentionally and 
unintentionally, taking things from each other for fun, cru- 
elty to animals, refusing to play together, and swearing. 

(o) Getting into and out of the building: — jostling, 
pushing, getting out of line, talking, and making unneces- 
sary noise. 

(p) Toward the teacher: — various forms of disrespect, 
disobedience of varying degrees, "pestering the teacher," 
lying. 

(q) Toward each other: — making faces, bothering, 
causing pain by pins and kicks, rudeness in various forms, 
lying, stealing. 



122 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(r) Toward the material used in the schoolroom: — 
carelessness, destructiveness, making needless dirt and 
noise, stealing, defacing, etc. 

(s) Toward study and exercises assigned by the teacher : 
— doing something else, attracting the attention of others 
by faces, drawings, and various antics, refusing to work 
honestly. 

(/) Toward the recitation: — sauciness, rudeness, im- 
politeness, failure to attend, talking aloud or to others. 
C. Offenses as springing from causes and motives. 
Taking these offenses one by one, one may ask from 
what causes or motives they may spring. Such an analysis will 
yield a long list of causes and motives. By cause of an act is 
meant that which produces the act but which is not consciously 
chosen by the person who acts. A motive is a chosen cause. 
Without following out the suggested analysis in detail, the causes 
and motives which underlie the prevalent offenses against the 
order of the school may be grouped and explained. 
The causes include: — 

1. Ignorance. 

2. Impulsiveness. 

3. Habit. 

4. Carelessness or thoughtlessness. 

5. Compulsion. 

6. Laziness. 

The motives include: — 

1. Selfishness. 

2. Meanness. 

Often a child's offense is due to his ignorance of what the 
effect of his act will be, and evidently all the child needs is the 
knowledge which his experience brings and enough reflection 
upon it to make it available for future inhibitions. Impulsive- 
ness means a yielding to impulse without reflection, and there- 
fore differs from ignorance. The treatment for impulsiveness 
is something that leads the child to inhibit his impulses and to 



DISCIPLINE 123 

reflect upon his conduct before its realization. Habit is akin 
to impulsiveness in that it proceeds without reflection, but it 
may have been consciously formed. The treatment for habit is 
something that inhibits the mechanical response to a given 
stimulus, or substitutes another response for it. A childish 
habit of throwing stones at cats may still exist as an impulse 
so strong that it leads a man to stoop down to get a stone 
when he sees a particularly offensive yellow cat on his front 
porch. 

Carelessness means that one does not care what the result 
of his action may be, and is a feeling attitude added to im- 
pulsiveness or to habit. The presence of the feeling, how- 
ever, does not warrant us in calling carelessness a motive. 
The general cure for carelessness is carefulness, which can 
spring only from interest and appreciation. Thoughtlessness 
means that one could have thought about the matter but did 
not. This may become a habit or may be accompanied by 
carelessness. Compulsion means that the doer was forced to 
do as he did; and everyone holds such a doer innocent because 
there was no free choice. Laziness may be a true cause of dis- 
orderly acts, especially that laziness which accompanies rapid 
physical growth. 

No one of these causes is consciously chosen, and offenses 
from such causes indicate that the child is not morally at fault. 
But when we pass to a consideration of motives, we enter a realm 
where choice is the essential element of the act. Selfishness 
describes all those variations of motive which lead one to choose 
an act (or end) for the purpose of maximizing self. Meanness 
includes all those variations of motive which lead one to choose 
an act (or end) for the purpose of maximizing self through the 
pain or loss of another. Some selfish acts are commendable if 
they imply no injury to others and increase one's ability to serve 
others. All meanness is base. 

The matter of dealing with offenses that spring from sel- 
fishness and meanness demands a more detailed treatment. 



124 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

D. Inhibition by negation and by substitution. 

There is a mechanism that underlies all conduct and teach- 
ers should understand it in order that its bearing on the treat- 
ment of selfishness and meanness may be clear. 

1. Any incoming impression from a sensory nerve ending, 
or any idea present in consciousness, provided it has sufficient 
intensity, is followed by a motor reaction or attitude. This 
is the law of dynamogenesis in its broadest statement. 

2. Inhibition means a stopping, a damming up of the out- 
going motor impulse. The outgoing motor impulse, instead of 
being followed by the natural, usual, or habitual reaction, is 
held in check or distributed over so wide an area that no 
destructive motion takes place. 

3. Inhibition by negation prevents the motor .impulse from 
going out in positive conduct and utilizes it in holding one's 
self in. The opposite muscles are stimulated, and, hence, there 
is always a sense of strain. The time-honored don'ts of adults, 
if obeyed, simply result in the child's effort to refrain from doing 
the thing in question, and at best result in merely a negative 
kind of virtue. 

4. Inhibition by substitution, on the contrary, means that 
the energy is directed into another channel. There is no 
damming up — no strain. The reaction which is substituted 
for the original one may be a commendable one, and thus the 
incipient bad reaction may be circumvented. This may be 
illustrated in various ways. 

A child has formed the habit of pulling the cat's tail — a 
process dangerous to the child and painful to the cat. The 
simple command not to do it has little effect because whenever 
the cat comes around the pulling of its tail is suggested to the 
child. Now, if by suggestion or by giving imitative copy, one 
can teach the child to stroke the cat, we have a case of the inhi- 
bition of one impulse by the substitution of another for it. 

Two small boys, three and a half and four and a half years 
old, respectively, were in a railway station, in care of their grand- 



DISCIPLINE 12,7 

father, waiting for a train. A downpour of rain occurred, and 
the water ran under the door and down to the center of the 
room in four small streams. When the boys spied this w T ater 
they at once started to play in it. The grandfather pictured to 
them the damage to their suits, their father's displeasure, and 
even threatened them with punishment, to no avail. A gentle- 
man who understood the principle of inhibition by substitution 
walked across the floor, avoiding the stream of water by walk- 
ing on his heels. He then asked these small boys if they were 
large enough to do that. They tried and succeeded fairly well. 
The gentleman then headed a procession of three which marched 
around the room and across the streams of water in the manner 
indicated, thus substituting a harmless reaction for one which 
was very undesirable. 

Speaking now in more general terms, we may say that every 
object, event, or situation suggests to a person, be he child or 
adult, a certain reaction. This suggestion exists as an impulse 
or tendency to action. If the stimulus remains, the impulse 
remains. The stimulus can not always be removed. There- 
fore, the wisest thing to do is to substitute a good reaction for 
the bad one. 

5. This principle of inhibition by substitution has a very 
wide application in life. Rudeness will disappear if we can 
succeed in teaching the child to be kind. A boy worked with 
carpenters the greater part of one summer, and, of course, 
picked up the profane expressions which they applied to ham- 
mers when the latter struck their fingers instead of the nails. 
The boy did not wish to swear, but did not know how to check 
the impulses. Finally an old man suggested to him that he 
whistle instead of swear when he struck his finger. This he 
succeeded in doing and thus escaped considerable profanity. 

When in connection with this principle one recalls the 
Lange-James theory of emotion, there is abundant proof of the 
principle already stated, viz., reactive conduct forms character. 
If the teacher can succeed in getting the child to respond in right 



126 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

ways and good ways to all the stimuli that play upon him, there 
are no problems of discipline left to consider. 

E. Kinds of punishment and their relation to the child's 
sense of self. 

Having now set forth the values of inhibition by negation 
and by substitution, the punishment of the prevalent school 
offenses may be taken up. Whenever offenses arise from what 
we have called ''causes," such as ignorance, habit, etc., kindly 
admonition, teaching, help, are the things that prove efficacious. 
When, however, offenses proceed from selfishness or meanness, 
there is need of effort on the teacher's part. If the principle 
of substitution fails to secure the desired formation or re-form- 
ation of the offender, then resort must be had to punishment. 

The noun punishment comes from the verb to punish. To 
punish is to cause pain. The word originally meant to cut or 
to slash, and was later attached to the feelings that result from 
cutting or slashing. Psychologists are pretty well agreed that 
pain is that which retards or hinders the mental life. There- 
fore, if the pupil's mental life is taking on the form of the bad, 
it is the parent's or the teacher's duty to retard or hinder that 
particular form of mental life. Punishment is pain inflicted 
with the purpose of reformation. Pain tends to destroy the 
reaction which produced it (and for this reason the past, espec- 
ially our childhood days, seems so happy as we live it over in 
memory), and also to destroy the reaction associated with it. 
These two tendencies of pain are the basis of all reformation 
through punishment. The "discipline of consequences," de- 
fended so ably by Spencer, 1 depends upon the child's associ- 
ating his pain with his own antecedent actions, and upon his 
recognition that his pain is but the inevitable effect of the immu- 
table laws of the universe. Pains tend to act as strong inhibit- 
ing ideas in young children, and in older ones, pains lead to 
reflection, resolution, and changed conduct. 

Since the efficiency of pain as a reformative agent rests 

l Education, Chapter on Moral Education. 



DISCIPLINE 127 

upon its inhibitive power, and since the inhibitive power is 
possible only through association, the child should understand 
clearly why he is punished so that he may regard the punish- 
ment as a consequence of his own act. If the child regards 
the punishment as the manifestation of the parent's or teacher's 
authority, or anger, or ill-will, he will rebel against it; and 
rebellion is not, and never leads to, reformation. 

If one should make a list of all the particular punishments 
used by teachers in schools, he would find that all have this 
common characteristic, viz., they cause pain. And we should 
find, further, that punishments readily fall into classes, as fol- 
lows : — 

Kinds of punishment: — 

(a) Corporal punishment. 

(b) Loss of social position. 

(c) Appeals to the sense of honor. 

(d) The subject matter as a punishment. 

(e) Reparation. 
(/) Saturation. 

(a) Corporal punishment — Corporal punishment includes 
all pain that is caused by overstimulation of any part of the body, 
from merely standing on the floor to the blood-letting form of 
whipping; it is the production of sensuous pain. The violation 
of nature's laws always yields pain of this kind, and to the child 
who has not learned to think of his self as separate from his 
body, corporal punishment is the most natural and effective 
thing in the world. In order to be clearly understood, it should 
be borne in mind that inhibition by substitution, when it brings 
the desired result, is far better than corporal punishment, and 
that only offenses that spring from selfishness and meanness and 
which do not yield to the influence of inhibition or entreaty are 
being considered. In such cases the child can learn, only by 
the mediation of sensuous pain, that society has the "right to 
resist his arbitrariness." 

Corporal punishment should never be unduly severe, nor 



128 " ELEMENTARY EDUCATION , 

be indiscriminately used. The brutal forms, such as stretching 
on tip-toe to reach a mark or holding out one's hand for several 
minutes, and the dangerous forms, such as boxing the ears, 
should not be used at all. In general, the recurrence of situa- 
tions that seem to demand corporal punishment proves that it 
has been ineffectual, and that it should be abandoned. 

(b) Loss of social position — By the time the child comes to 
school, he has acquired a sense of himself as related to others, 
a social consciousness that is strong in some respects and weak 
in others. In short, the child has come to think of himself as 
having a certain social position. This sense of social position 
is pleasurable to the child, and to be deprived of it is painful. 
Therefore, if through either selfishness or meanness the child 
has committed an offense, he may be made conscious of this 
offense and be brought to a resolution about future conduct by 
the loss of social position. 

A boy in the first grade who had been playing along the 
creek, "for fun," as he said, when he should have gone directly 
home, was required to come to school and to go home with some 
adult for some time. This sense of isolation from his fellows 
led him to reflect, and was much more effective than either cor- 
poral punishment or scolding would have been. Having a pupil 
stand on the floor, stay in at recess, sit on a front seat, etc., are 
forms of loss of social position. These forms are effective only 
when the isolation is mentally real, for spatial isolation amounts 
to nothing. And it is true of the loss of social position as it is 
of corporal punishment that its effectiveness rests upon the 
association of ideas and the resolution which the child himself 
makes. 

Corporal punishment and loss of social position may be 
combined in one punishment. The child may be humiliated 
by receiving corporal punishment in the presence of his peers. 
Usually, however, such procedure results in a real or feigned 
indifference to the sensuous pain and the loss of social position. 
The child soon outgrows the stage in which corporal punishment 



DISCIPLINE 129- 

is effective. Children over ten years of age are often harmed more 
than they are benefited by corporal punishment, for they feel 
that their bodies are not their real selves. So, too, children 
outgrow punishment by the loss of social position. They become 
independent and often do not care whether they stand in the 
same relation to others that they formerly occupied: Especially do 
they look with indifference upon the simple spatial isolation 
which is all the teacher can, unaided, bring about. But if the 
school is a real social group, and if the social group shuts the 
offender out from participation, then the offender does care. 

(c) Appeals to the sense of honor — Right out of social rela- 
tionships there grows the sense of honor, — of loyalty and devo- 
tion to the right. The sense of honor implies a conceptual stage 
of thinking and also the existence of ethical ideals. " Ideals are 
the forms which we feel our conceptions would take if we were 
able to realize them in a satisfying degree of unity, harmony, 
.significance, and universality. "* The sense of honor also im- 
plies the existence of a willingness to conform one's conduct to 
accepted ethical ideals. Assuming, then, the existence of the 
sense of honor, an appeal to it always makes the one to whom 
the appeal is made feel that he has in some way fallen short of 
his ideal (ideal pain), and that he ought to conform to the ideal. 
The imperative, or command, is, in all such cases, internal; and 
the resulting activity is self-activity in the truest and most 
genuine sense. Such activity is self-government of the purest 
type. This is the true end of all discipline — to lead the child 
to govern himself aright. 

But ethical ideals do not spring into existence all at once. 
Many persons who would not steal a horse or break into a house 
because of restraining ethical ideals, will, nevertheless, cheat in 
an examination or hand in, as their own, work that is not wholly 
their own. Ethical ideals are- as truly dynamic as concepts are, 
and therefore the arrival at a certain age limit does not imply 
the existence of any clearly defined set of ethical ideals. But 

l Baldwin's Elements ofPsi/cholof)!/, p. 283, 



130 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

in so far as such ideals do exist, the most effective means of 
developing the child into a genuinely moral being is to lead him 
to conform his conduct to his own sense of honor. 

(d) The subject matter as a punishment — Many school 
offenses consist essentially of a wrong attitude of the pupil toward 
study either in the study period or in the recitation itself. Since 
the child has failed to devote himself to study as he should have 
done, it appeals to many people as simple justice that the delin- 
quent offender should be punished by being made to do the 
work he has failed to do. And this neglected work must be 
done outside of regular school hours. The pain produced by 
such a punishment consists in the fatigue attendant upon doing 
the work, in the loss of pleasures the offender might otherwise 
have enjoyed, and in the humiliation that arises from not being 
able to do as others do. This pain may lead the child to devote 
himself to his tasks and duties so that he may avoid future pains, 
but it is very likely to be associated either with the subject 
matter itself or with the teacher, and thus to grow into a dislike. 

(e) Reparation — Reparation, as a form of punishment, is 
the application of the principle of justice to the settlement of 
offenses which have resulted in a damage that may be restored. 
If a pupil in his play accidentally break a window glass, the only 
suitable punishment is the. restoration of the glass. If it were 
broken maliciously, there should be restoration and perhaps 
some additional pain to act as a future inhibiting idea or as 
an incentive to reflection. Many of the differences among 
children are of the kind that may be best settled by reparation. 
Apology is a form of reparation in which one expresses regret 
for his offense and asks that the offended one forgive it. Apology 
is an evidence of fine spirit when it is self-initiated, but is com- 
pletely shorn of its worth and efficiency when it is forced. 

Reparation should always be chosen by the offender, should 
be in proportion to the injury done, and should cause the offen- 
der some effort. The parents of some pupils once offered to 
repay the damage their children had done, and were with difficulty 



DISCIPLINE 131 

convinced that their children would really profit by saving their 
pennies and even car fare to pay on the installment plan. The 
teacher's plan was to pay the damage and then have each child 
pay him a minimum sum each week until the whole was paid, 
for he did not wish these children to get the idea that their 
parents could, by any sort of generosity, wipe out the offense by 
one payment. The easier plan is to "square accounts" at once, 
but the easiest plan is not always the best for the offender ; and 
teachers should never lose sight of the offender's genuine 
reformation. 

(/) Saturation — Saturation, as a form of punishment, is 
compelling the offender to repeat the offense until he is sick of 
it. All have heard of compelling children to eat apples before 
the school until they could eat no more, to make faces till their 
faces ached, to chew gum till they could chew no longer. This 
form of punishment has considerable value in training the lower 
animals into (to them) unnatural habits, and also in getting 
very young children over certain actions which to them seem 
"smart." It is wiser, in the home, not to notice such actions 
and to let the child outgrow them, for if these things are unno- 
ticed they soon lose their attractiveness to the child. In school, 
however, such actions interfere with effective work and should 
be dealt with by some other method than that of saturation, for 
saturation usually produces more interference with the work 
of the school than do the offenses for which it is a punishment. 

§ 31. CONCLUSIONS REGARDING DISCIPLINE. 

Taking a broad view, it is evident that the ultimate value 
and effectiveness of all punishment lies not so much in the in- 
hibitive value of the pain inflicted as in the right conduct which 
issues from the reflection to which the offender is led by the pain 
of the punishment. The primary object of the teacher, then, in 
administering punishment should be to bring the child to reason, 
to lead him to re-form himself. In fact, punishment is success- 



132 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

ml only in so far as it leads the child to a new, saner, more ethical 
thought of himself. 

But, after all, punishment is but a small fraction of school 
discipline — the negative side, for the worthy thing the child 
is led to do because of interest and cooperation is as truly form- 
ative as is the refraining from the bad thing because of punish- 
ment. And, in simple truth, punishment has only an external 
result until there arises a formation of the right attitude through 
reflection. All discipline, therefore, is formative, and punish- 
ment is formative only by being reformative. The teacher's 
conception of discipline should be that it is this character, or 
attitude, forming aspect of school organization and manage- 
ment, and not merely the more or less warlike dealing with the 
obstreperous. Nine-tenths of the problem of school discipline 
is solved if children are kept interestedly busy doing worthy 
things. The one-tenth is due to selfishness and meanness in 
children and to the irritability and lack of poise of the teacher. 

The highest type of morality (that of pure self-determina- 
tion, or conscious choice of the good for its own sake) is indeed 
the ideal towards the realization of which the teacher's every 
effort should be directed, but it is doubtful whether much of it 
will be seen in the actions of elementary school pupils. The 
moral development of the child is even slower than his intel- 
lectual development and more subject to arrested development. 
This fact renders it doubly important for the teacher to have a 
clear vision of the end to be reached, and also for him to under- 
stand the process by which the end may be reached. The human 
will is like a man who can lay brick, but not make them, in that 
it can command but not originate movements. The first sense 
of self comes as the consequence of involuntary movements 
(random, reflex, sensory, impulsive, instinctive, etc.). The 
sense of power to do, of freedom of the will, of pure self-deter- 
mination is possible (genetically) only on the basis of involun- 
tary movement. Hence, morality at first exists as conformity 
to external standards set up by the family and society. By 



DISCIILINE 133 

conformity to these standards there grows up an inner sense 
of what is good, the conscience. The whole integrated gamut 
of experience finds its concentrated reality in the act of will to 
which conscience leads. Therefore, the whole matter of ele- 
mentary school discipline may be summed up by saying: — 

1. By doing good and acceptable things under the sug- 
gestions and directions and even punishments of the teacher, 
the child gets a sense of what standards of morality are accepted 
as highest by his society. 

2. By participation (by doing) the child's inner sense of 
ethical attitude is formed and refined into what we call con- 
science. 

3. By initiating activity for himself, in response to situa- 
tions not previously experienced, the will of the child develops, 
and thus his character, or deepest, inner self is formed. 

4. As knowledge increases and insight becomes keener, 
finer ethical discriminations are made (through reflection upon 
experiences), and thus the individual becomes independent in 
his will as he is also independent in his intellect. 



CHAPTER VIII. 
The Recitation. 

§ 32. what the recitation now is. 

Before considering what the recitation should be, it is well 
to see what the recitation now is. Fortunately for our purpose 
the recitation has not drifted much from its primitive linguistic 
meaning. Recitation (re, again; citdre, to quote, to say) liter- 
ally means "the act of saying over again." This word was 
probably coined by some old-time Latin schoolmaster, and 
was an excellent one to describe what probably occurred in his 
school. It was but natural, also, that when subjects other than 
Latin became parts of the curriculum, the method of teaching 
Latin should be applied to these subjects. Many men now living 
distinctly remember that in their school days the teacher merely 
"heard them say their lessons." The periods of study were 
devoted almost as exclusively to memorizing as they are in 
Chinese schools to-day, and the recitation periods to a saying 
over again what had been memorized. It was believed that by 
this repetition, knowledge would become a permanent acquisi- 
tion, and in this belief there was an element of truth. This 
theory and practice, however, neglect the power of interest, 
and the value of getting the idea before getting the symbol of 
the idea. 

Still, in this old memory-repetition belief there was enough 
of truth to enable it to survive even to the present day. One 
who visits elementary schools frequently can scarcely fail 
to notice that much of the recitation time is now devoted to 
"saying over again what the book says." The question as 
to the part of the recitation period now devoted to re-cit-ing 

134 



THE RECITATION L35 

was recently put to a teachers' institute of two hundred mem- 
bers, most of whom were engaged in teaching rural schools. 
The average answer thus obtained is that nearly three-fourths 
of the recitation time is actually spent in this way, This may 
be too large an estimate for rural schools as a whole, but it is 
perhaps fairly typical of the truth. In graded schools there is 
relatively much less time spent in this way. The fact remains, 
however, that in our elementary schools (and often in second- 
ary schools as well) the literal meaning of recitation is fairly 
descriptive of what actually occurs in the recitation. 

Why the one who conducts such a process should be called 
a teacher is difficult to understand. Such a process may be 
keeping school, but it fails to meet our modern ideals of what 
constitutes teaching. Before we can decide as to what the 
recitation should be, we must inquire more closely into what 
teaching is. 

§ 33. WHAT IT IS TO TEACH. 

An illustration may well precede an attempt at definition. 

The natural world about us — air, motion, land, water, heat, 
cold, trees, flowers, sunshine, grass, animals, stones, etc., is 
constantly pressing against our nerve-endings; and in conse- 
quence of these stimuli we adapt ourselves to them, or to the 
natural world, or to Nature. The evidence of this adaptation 
is our changed conduct or behavior. Nature teaches us many 
things which remain for the most part unconscious, except as 
we become conscious of them by their absence in others. One 
learns to eat when hungry, to come in out of the rain, etc. If 
one does not know enough to eat available food when hungry, 
or to come in out of the rain, he is justly regarded as extremely 
stupid. "The insistent forces of the world have not been able 
to bring about in him the simplest kind of a reaction." The 
test of one's having learned from Nature and of Nature's having 
taught one is found in his conduct or reactive behavior in the 
presence of certain stimuli. But back of this reactive behavior 



136 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

there is an organization of intelligence, a changed sequence and 
character of the person's mental life, or of his ideas. The real 
teaching by Nature must be the bringing about of this changed 
sequence and character of the mental life. Whether one looks 
upon this teaching of Nature as conscious on its part, or as a 
means by which God teaches us, or as a fortunate and happy 
accident, does not in the least affect the view here advanced, 
viz., Nature teaches human beings by influencing the sequence 
and character of their ideas. 

Another illustration of what teaching is may make the mat- 
ter clearer. 

Human beings are so constituted that they instinctively 
tend to imitate what they see about them, at first for the sheer 
pleasure of doing it, and later for utility, for ambitious ends, for 
religious ends, for aesthetic ends, or what not. It has been 
claimed that all industrial inventions are imitations of natural 
things, as, for example: the savage's club is an imitation of the 
human arm and clenched fist; the sickle of the reaper, an imi- 
tation of the old hand sickle and the motion of the arm in using 
it; barbed wire, an imitation of the thorns of the osage tree 
which had long been used as a fence. One's use of gesture in 
describing things is the effort to imitate the outline or qualities 
of the things: even the wide-opening of the eyes when speaking 
of large things is an imitation of the effort of seeing large things. 
The child astride a stick imitates the action of a horse and rider. 
This account of the imitation of things could be extended indefi- 
nitely, but enough instances have been cited to prove that reac- 
tive behavior is influenced by the animate and inanimate things 
about us because of our instinctive imitative tendency. 

Moreover, one imitates persons both consciously and un- 
consciously. The demand of the law that the teacher be a per- 
son of good moral character is the conscious, legal recognition 
of the fact that children unconsciously imitate older persons 
who control them. The mother tongue is chiefly acquired by 
an unconscious imitative process. One learns things from 



THE RECITATION 137 

certain persons without even knowing that he is learning. The 
converse of this, that persons and things teach without one's 
knowing; that he is taught, is true. This unconscious influence 
of persons and things is very important because of its amount 
and because of its relative value in life. But what is this uncon- 
scious teaching of persons and things? The evidence of such 
teaching is found in terms of reactive behavior, in habits, in con- 
duct. But back of these there must exist a corresponding 
organization of mental life which finds its expression in these 
forms. As was said above, the real unconscious teaching of 
persons and things must be the bringing about of a changed 
sequence and character of the mental life. This accounts for 
the great unconscious influence of the natural and social environ- 
ments of the child, especially when he is in the plastic, imitative 
stage of development. 

The tuition of Nature and the unconscious tuition of per- 
sons and things have been illustrated and discussed. But there 
is another kind of teaching which is done consciously and with 
purpose. This is the sense in which the term teaching is ordi- 
narily used — the narrower sense of the schoolroom. Suppose 
that a child is taught to add fractions whose denominators are 
unlike or unequal, or to extract the cube root of a number, or 
that the Confederates were victorious at the battle of Bull Run, 
or that a verb should agree with its subject in person and num- 
ber, or any one of the thousand things usually taught in school. 
What has been done in teaching him this fragment of knowl- 
edge ? 

The child's knowledge is shown by his reactive behavior, 
he replies properly to your question in words or in action of some 
sort, he performs the problem with figures or with objects, etc. 
By the child's reaction you judge of his knowledge. Back of 
his conduct there is an organization of his mental life which 
was not there before he was taught. But if, after efforts to teach 
him, his reactive conduct is the same that it was before these 
efforts, you rightly conclude that he has not learned, and that 



138 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the teacher has not taught. One may go through the motions 
of shoveling all day without moving an ounce of sand or dirt, 
and one may go through the motions of teaching without really 
teaching. The changed mental life of the child is as essential 
to the teaching process as is the movement of some material to 
the shoveling of sand. "By their fruits ye shall know them" 
is as true of teachers as it is of trees. 

But how has one been able to bring about this changed 
mental life — this changed sequence and character of the child's 
ideas? One may have plied him with questions, or made him 
say over words, or had him handle objects, or make something 
in sand or in clay or from paper, etc. But whatever the teacher 
may have done, it may be expressed in general terms as a massing 
or utilization of stimuli. The teacher has brought some stimulus 
or other to bear upon some nerve-ending or other, and this 
stimulus has been followed by a change in the child's mental life. 

Summing up the essential ideas that have emerged from 
these analyses of the teaching of Nature, of the unconscious 
tuition of persons and things, and of the conscious, purposed 
teaching of the schoolroom, we may say: — 

1. Teaching is influencing or changing the sequence or 
the character of another's ideas, a change which would not have 
occurred had it not been for the act of teaching. 

2. The only way of knowing that this change has really 
occurred is by an interpretation of the person's reactive behavior, 
his conduct, his reaction, his activity. 

3. The teacher, in order to bring about this changed mental 
life, has brought certain appropriate stimuli to bear upon the 
child's nerve-endings. 

§ 34. THE RELATION OF REACTIVE BEHAVIOR TO LEARNING AND 
TO TEACHING. 

Reverting now to a former inquiry as to what the recitation 
should be, it is clear that should it be, distinctively, a period 
of effort on the part of the teacher to bring to bear upon the 



THE RECITATION 139 

child those stimuli which will bring; about the desired change in 
the sequence and character of the child's ideas as a basis for 
the right kind of reactive behavior. Before continuing the dis- 
cission it may be well to examine a little more fully the relation 
of this reactive behavior to the changed mental life of the child. 

Behavior follows the changed mental condition, but there is 
another equally important truth about it. The behavior is 
motor activity of any and all sorts ; it is equivalent to expression 
in its widest sense. Anyone can understand that this action of 
the muscles excites nerve-endings. As a consequence, every 
motor activity causes a return wave of impressions which stream 
back to the central brain and which are followed by sensations 
of having acted. These sensations of having acted — the so- 
called return wave of consciousness — are extremely important 
because they are essentially educative. From these sensations 
of having acted one decides upon the worth of the object to him, 
he assumes an attitude toward it. 

The summation and integration of these separate attitudes 
towards things, persons, events, relations, institutions, ideas, 
etc., constitute one's attitude toward the world as a whole. And 
this attitude toward the world as a whole is a revelation of what 
one really is. As James says: "The motor consequences clinch 
the impression." It is through this outgoing motor activity of 
the self (either actually or ideally) that the self grows. Hence, 
the reactive conduct of the child reveals his mental life and at 
the same time organizes the self. From this explanation of the 
functions of motor activity one is able to understand this wide- 
reaching pedagogical maxim: "No reception without reaction; 
no impression without correlative expression." 1 

It is now clear that the teacher in the recitation should use 
the reaction of the child for two purposes, viz., to find out what 
organization of the mental life, or self, has actually occurred, 
and as a means for further organization of the self. The motor 
activity of the child both forms and reveals the child's mind. 

i James' Talks to Teachers, p. 33. 



140 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

It is evident, therefore, that the " saying over again what 
the book says," the review, is a kind of reaction, is a method of 
teaching, and as such has a proper place in any system or 
method of instruction. The time to be given to this kind of 
work will depend upon the nature of the subject or knowledge 
taught and upon the capacity of the child. The division of 
subjects into form and content studies is valuable to the teacher 
in this connection as showing where repetition is necessary. 
As, for example, when in arithmetic a multiplication table has 
been presented concretely, when the ideas are mastered, and the 
symbols understood, then repetition is valuable as the only 
efficient way of gaining a ready control of the symbols. So, 
too, in making certain vocal sounds, in marking the sounds of 
letters in words, in spelling words that recur frequently, in mas- 
tering rules and definitions that are frequently used and have 
been inductively developed, repetition is proper enough. In 
general, wherever the use of symbols has to take the form of 
habit, or wherever motor activity should take this form, there 
repetition, drill, saying over again, doing over again, viewing 
again (review), are in place. But in all this repetition work one 
should have regard for the capacity of the child to form habits. 
This capacity is not a constant in the life of any one child, and 
much less is it equally great in all children. The teacher should 
discover what the capacity of the child for this particular kind 
of work is by carefully studying the individual child, guided 
only by this general law, viz., the reactive behavior of the child 
should be fairly and adequately representative of what his men- 
tal life really is. 

Granting the general law just stated, and conceding that 
reactive behavior integrates knowledge with the use of knowl- 
edge, that is, that it forms character, one should inquire into the 
various forms of this reactive behavior, of expression ; and, later, 
ask if the verbal reaction is sufficient for the educative purposes 
of the school. One should bear in mind in this discussion that 
behavior has both a positive and a negative phase: "to do and 



THE RECITATION 141 

not to do are equally forms of behavior." Every internal stress 
or strain is simply behavior that does not take large visible forms 
such as jumping the rope or running. 

In presenting this subject to teachers, the author has suc- 
ceeded in getting many ways of dividing it, and now offers the 
following outline made by one of his classes. The classifica- 
tion is not exhaustive at all, but is designed to show at a glance 
that the field of reactive behavior is much wider and more 
significant than teachers usually think it to be. 

FORMS OF REACTIVE BEHAVIOR OR EXPRESSION. 1 

I. Vocal:— 

1. Verbal. 

2. Whistling. 

3. Singing. 

II. Hand:— 

1. Writing. 

2. Drawing. 

3. Painting. 

4. Cutting. 

5. Sewing. 

III. Hand and body: — 

1. Modeling. 

2. Carving. 

3. Weaving. 

4. Construction work. 

5. Manual training. 

6. Domestic science. 

IV. Body as a whole. 

1. Dramatization. 

2. Gesture and bodily expression. 

3. Games. 

This outline omits many forms of physical activity which 

l Parker's Talks on Pedagogics, pp. 223-260, has a slightly different analy- 
sis and treatment of "Modes of Expression." 



142 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

may be used by the teacher, and emphasizes only those which 
the teacher may use in forming the child in the schoolroom. 

If any one of these forms of expression be analyzed, its 
formative aspect is at once revealed. Take, for illustration, 
painting: proficiency in painting indicates that one has become 
skilled in expressing ideas with color. And to have a pupil 
paint means that the teacher is striving to organize him in a 
certain definite way. Skill in any one of these forms of expres- 
sion means that one's inner self has been changed there- 
through and thereby. Motor skill carries along with it the 
correlative organization of the mind. This is simply saying 
again, and for emphasis, that reactive conduct forms character. 

Going back now to the question, Is the verbal reaction 
sufficient for educative purposes? an answer may be readily 
formed. The child learns to use oral words as symbols of ideas 
early in life and this process of learning continues till late in life. 
When he enters school the book presents a new set of symbols 
for the child's ideas, the crooked marks of the printed page. 
The child is in constant danger of giving the oral equivalent of 
the printed symbol without having the equivalent meaning in 
consciousness. Especially is this true when the teacher esti- 
mates the child's knowledge almost wholly in word reproducing 
ability. Therefore, during the first twelve years of a child's 
life, words should be used chiefly as symbols of meanings already 
obtained. After the child has thus acquired a stock of words 
which express his ideas, he may increase his stock of ideas by 
comparing them with one another, or he may study the printed 
page whose separate symbols have meanings, and thus get new 
meanings. 

The age of adolescence is usually taken as the time at which 
the greatest transition to the use of symbols as means of idea- 
getting takes place; but even this is somewhat in doubt, although 
our plan of secondary school work is really based upon the 
assumed truth that the child is able to get ideas from the sym- 
bolism of the printed page. In many children the greatest 



THE RECITATION 143 

transition comes much earlier than adolescence; in some, later 
than this; and in various degrees from the earliest use of symbols. 
The reality of the child's expanding mental life is ill-fitted to the 
preconceptions of adults. The central point, however, is that 
since the verbal reaction sinks early in the child's life to the 
plane of unconscious habit, there is always danger of verbalism 
in elementary school work; and that, therefore, to be assured 
of the child's real mental condition, to insure the proper organi- 
zation of the growing self of the child, the teacher should utilize 
other forms of expression along with the verbal reaction. 

Further than this: — the forms of expression already given 
are the basal reactions upon which the greater part of the motor 
life of mankind is founded. Industrial processes, on the motor 
side, are combinations of these simpler and more fundamental 
reactions. The sculptor is the fruition of modeling and carving; 
the actor, the realization of the dramatic instinct or tendency; 
tapestry weavers, such as William Morris, combine the a^t 
instinct with the refinements of simple weaving. The arts and 
industries, the occupations and callings, the so-called fine arts, 
the motor and aesthetic and volitional life of adults, arise from 
these simpler forms of expression as the purity and beauty of 
the lily arise from the unseen ourity and beauty of soil, moisture, 
and heat. 

Therefore, for the child's self to be organized into the 
mental equivalent of these forms of reactive behavior is simply 
to organize him into a human being. He may not paint beauti- 
ful pictures, weave matchless tapestries, act out Shakespeare's 
superb tragedies, construct palatial dwellings, nor shape the 
destinies of a great nation; but these ennobling and helpful 
things, and many others besides, are open to him; and, ideally 
at least, he can truly live in these great achievements of the race. 
The control of these fundamental forms of reaction enables one 
to project himself into the life of the race — past, present, and 
future. The basis of sympathy with those who work at forge 
or in factory is found more in musculai 4 attitude than in intel- 



144 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

lectual idea. To one who has been trained even a few years in 
the utilization of color to express his ideas, no great painting 
can be insignificant or uninteresting. To one trained to use 
hammer and plane and saw, architectural achievements have a 
world of meaning. To him who has become humanized, all 
things human are interesting. 

Time was, perhaps, when the classical languages provided 
the best humanizing material available for school use; but with 
the present industrial, social, and ethical organization of society, 
the realization of human attitudes through actual behavior and 
not through the study of the classics, should commend itself to 
all. This claim is in no wise counter to that of literature whose 
value in furnishing ideal attitudes as complements of real atti- 
tudes is inestimable. The essential point urged here is that the 
fundamental forms of expression are necessary to any adequate 
interpretation of the past, to any adequate participation in the 
motor, intellectual, and aesthetic life of the present, and neces- 
sary to any adequate participation in the ideal life of the race. 

In this analysis of the field of reactive behavior, it is not the 
purpose to state specifically the reasons which warrant the use 
of any of these forms of expression as school subjects, but simply 
to show the relation of expression to the development of the 
child's self and to show also that the verbal reaction should 
follow, not precede, in elementary schools, those more signifi- 
cant forms of expression which integrate the child's experiences 
into a self in harmony with the human pattern. From these 
considerations it follows that freedom in the use of oral language, 
in all cases where tact cannot secure both freedom and accuracy, 
is to be preferred to accuracy. It also follows that freedom in 
the use of gesture and illustrative drawing by pupils should be 
encouraged. Life, spontaneity, freedom of thought and expres- 
sion are worth seeking after; but in large part they are uncon- 
sciously copied from the teacher by the pupils. A lazy, dull, 
prosaic teacher never taught any thing but a dull, lazy, prosaic 
school. The teacher should realize that a free, enthusiastic 



THE RECITATION 145 

expression of an idea in any form, crude though it be, is more 
educative to the child than an accurate expression realized list- 
lessly and grudgingly. 

Moreover, the teacher should realize that children differ 
widely in respect to their reactive behavior. Some children 
throw their deeds into the world with utter abandon; others 
are reticent and shy, and seem to dam up the expression within 
the limits of their own bodies. The former are of the so-called 
" motor type," the latter of the "sensory type." The motor 
child is apt to seize upon the incoming impression eagerly and 
to react immediately, unthinkingly. He needs to be checked, 
to be held in, to be forced to think twice or even thrice before he 
acts. In short, he needs to be made reflective, self-conscious. 
The sensory child, on the contrary, deliberates too much, is too 
cautious, thinks too much of self and of the relation of an expres- 
sion to the self. Such a child needs to overcome this reticence, 
needs to be so stirred up that self is forgotten, that the expression, 
because of its intensity, breaks down all inhibitions and becomes 
a torrent.' Reactive behavior other than the verbal form, with 
not too great coordination and complexity, will secure the best 
results from children of the sensory type, while some highly 
coordinated reaction requiring thought for its performance is 
best for those of the motor type. 1 

In this section (pp. 138-145), it has been shown that reactive 
behavior forms character; it is through motor attitude that the 
child gets his sense of self, his sense of others, and his knowledge 
of things. x\ll of this motor activity (except that which is uncon- 
scious) has back of it an active intelligence, thinking, self- 
activity. Genetically considered, all knowledge rests upon 
motor adjustment to some stimulus or other. We not only learn 
to do through doing, but we also learn to think and to feel 
through doing. Upon this motor basis other and higher forms 
of mental activity may and should be built; but without this 
basis all else is built upon sand and is lacking in that quality of 

l Story of the Mind, p. 166 ff. J. M. Baldwin. 



146 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

genuine appreciation which can exist only on the basis of actual 
experience. Hence, if it be the aim of education to humanize 
children, the only safe method is to accomplish this through 
activity. Through behavior one first receives and then ex- 
presses his thoughts and feelings. 

§ 35. THE MEANS AT THE DISPOSAL OF THE TEACHER FOR 
SECURING REACTIVE BEHAVIOR. 

It is necessary, from the standpoint of teaching, to pass from 
a consideration of the forms of expression, their place in teach- 
ing, and their relative importance, to a consideration of the 
means at the disposal of the teacher for securing reactive behav- 
ior. It has been stated that teaching brings appropriate stimuli 
to bear upon the child's nerve-endings. If the reaction is not 
a proper one, the teacher utilizes additional stimuli. He may 
present the object again, have another child repeat the previous 
statement, ask a question, show a picture, make a sketch on the 
blackboard, make a model of the thing under consideration, 
etc. But in all this he simply brings stimuli to bear upon sight, 
hearing, taste, smell, tactile, or muscular organs, some nerve- 
ending is specially excited. One does not usually consider this 
excitation of the nerve-ending as important for it is looked upon 
' merely as a means to an end. This excitation of a nerve-ending 
is followed by (causes ?) a change, or excitation among the brain 
cells ; this changed cerebral condition is followed by (causes ?) a 
change in the sequence and character of the child's mental life; 
this changed sequence and character of the mental life is followed 
by (causes ?) another brain condition, which, in turn, is followed 
by (causes?) an expression, or motor attitude. 1 Since this is 
true, the next important topic to be considered is the various 
kinds of stimuli the teacher may use to bring about a truly educa- 
tive activity. 

i The question here raised as to whether is followed by is equivalent to 
causes is important for philosophy, hut not for skill in teaching. All teachers, 
whatever their belief, act as if the relation between bodily states and mental states 
were a causal one. 



THE RECITATION 147 

The first and most obvious classification is the onej^ased 
upon appeals to eye and to ear. The teacher may successfully 
appeal to the eye through his own hand or bodily behavior. A 
gesture by the teacher often serves better than words would have 
served. A look is frequently better than anything else would 
have been. An object or a picture may also be used to secure 
the desired reaction. 

The human voice, however, is the educative instrument 
par excellence because oral words are usually significant, and 
because oral words are so well adapted to the capacity of the 
child; their meaning may be changed by emphasis, intonation, 
or accompanying gesture ; simple words may be used in place of 
new or difficult, ones. Supplemented as oral speech may be 
by gestures, drawing, diagrams, etc., it becomes one of the most 
efficient modes of expressing thought to others and of arousing 
thought in others. This well-nigh perfect instrument of sym- 
bolic expression may take the form of a command, a polite 
request, a suggestion, or a question. 

§ 36. THE NATURE OF THE COMMAND AND OF THE POLITE 
REQUEST. 

The verbal command is the expression by means of words 
or gesture of one person's will regarding the activity of another 
person's will. In the school the teacher stands as the legal or 
temporary parent of the child whose development is to be brought 
about through obedience to the teacher's will. This will of the 
teacher may be expressed positively or negatively. With young 
children the concrete part of the command remains in con- 
sciousness while the abstract elements fade quickly away. To 
most children do not is an abstraction. The mother who left 
her children alone, saying, "Do not put beans in your noses" 
did not understand psychology very well. Hence, with young 
children, commands should usually be stated concretely and 
positively. 

But beyond the form of the command there is always a 



148 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

content, a something which is to become the content of the 
child's will. This content may be suitable or not suitable. 
Too often both parents and teachers command children just to 
show that they have the power to do so. Whenever a command 
is an infringement on the personality of the one commanded, 
there is inward rebellion, and with this inward rebellion there is 
either open defiance or else listless, wooden conformity. The 
child's will takes on the commanded form simply because he 
feels that he must do it in order to avoid painful consequences to 
himself. He only passively acquiesces. In this passive acqui- 
escence there is less of growth and power than there is in active 
choosing without the presence of compulsion. The working of 
commands may be illustrated by a little incident which occurred 
recently. 

F., aged nine, was playing in an unused street with his 
sister two years his junior, and with two other boys of about his 
OAvn age. The little girl was watching the boys avIio were 
engaged in a spirited contest as to which one could hit a dilapi- 
dated sign-board the most times out of twelve throws each. 
They were keeping the score and adding it up after each round 
of throws. Suddenly the mother, from the basement door, 
called the little girl who shiftlessly shuffled toward the house. 
Then she called to F, "What are you doing now?" 

"Oh, just throwing rocks at that old sign over there." 

"Well, you come right here." 

"What do you want, ma?" 

"I want you to come here this minute." 

"Do you want me to do something?" 

'Come here! Do you hear me?" 

"Y-a-a-s. But ma, we're tryin' to see who can hit that sign 
the most times out of twelve throws, and I've got — " 

"If you don't come here you'll get something else." 

"Oh, durn it all! A feller can't do nuthin' without you git 
right after him. Can't have no fun without a fuss." 

As he went toward the house, he turned back to sav: — 



THE RECITATION 149 

"Kids! You stay here and I'll be back as soon as the old 
woman cools off a bit. She's awful cranky." 

And he was back in four minutes, having slipped away 
from his mother who had by this time forgotten her anger. 

Evidently F. regarded the command of his mother as an 
infringement upon his rights as a boy. And what did he get 
out of his experience? A hardened heart, and an increased 
degree of an already great irreverence. When he is nine years 
older and his mother pleads with him to stay off the street or 
not to smoke, etc., he will probably say to himself: — 

"I'm going to do just as I please. I'd rather be with the 
fellows than fussed at here at home by an old crank like ma is." 

Arbitrary and unreasonable commands make children 
lawless and irreverent. It is easy to treat children as we treat 
pieces of crayon — toss them hither and thither as we please, 
and difficult really to respect the child's personality and rights. 
Sometimes the personality of the child is deformed, degenerated, 
tinged with meanness; and for the child's own good his depraved 
personality must be made to conform to the better personality 
of the teacher's or parent's will. But all such cases prove a pre- 
vious error on the part of some one other than the child, and 
somebody other than the child should sit upon an ash-heap clad 
in sackcloth in humble repentance for his sins. 

The polite request, however, does not imply the compulsion 
which is always present in the command. The request simply 
asks, in substance, if the child will do the thing in question. 
"Will you bring me a sample of red clover from the meadow 
to-morrow?" is a thing whose content becomes realized in the 
child's action by virtue of his own choice. This choice will 
depend upon his respect for the teacher, and the child yields 
to the polite request because of his desire to do what the teacher 
wishes him to do. From the standpoint of the development and 
growth of the child, it should be evident that there is more of 
real educative value for the child in action which is based upon 
polite requests than in conduct based upon commands. 



150 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

§ 37. THE NATURE OF THE SUGGESTION. 

In the suggestion, so-called, the content is simply brought 
before the child's mind as a possibility; to realize it in terms 
of behavior he must decide and then execute his decision; the 
content, or end, or realization, seems to be his own and not 
another's. Hence, the suggestion leads to a more genuine 
development of the child's will than does the command, or even 
the polite request. "Wouldn't it be fine if someone should 
bring in leaves from the red oak and the white oak to-morrow?" 
is an example of suggestion. What is really desired in behavior 
is not mere conformity (though that may be at times very desira- 
ble), but rather a growth of self into a spirit of conformity. The 
suggestion has a strong tendency to promote this growth. It is in 
the wielding of suggestion with tact that many teachers fail. A 
tactful and opportune massing of suggestion secures better results 
in orderliness, even from the standpoint of mere conformity, 
than does brute force, however brutal it may be. Kindliness, 
polish, and politeness to children should be more prominent in 
teachers than they are, if for no other reason than because of 
the increased effectiveness which they impart to oral suggestion. 



CHAPTER IX. 

The Recitation (Concluded). 

§ 38. THE NATURE AND KINDS OF THE QUESTION. 

Although in the actual conduct of the recitation command 
and suggestion have a very important place, they do not approach 
in effectiveness the question. The question is to the teacher 
what the chisel is to the sculptor, what the brush is to the artist — 
his most important instrument. Every artist can tell just why 
he uses the color he does use, every sculptor knows just what he 
wishes to accomplish by every chip he cuts from the marble, but 
few teachers can tell just why they use the questions they do use, 
or can show any relation of the questions they use to the end 
they wish to accomplish. Surely teaching can not be artistic 
unless the teacher is an adept in the use of questions. The 
lawyer is the only other person to whom questioning is as im- 
portant as it is to the teacher. In getting testimony before the 
court, in attempting to break down testimony already introduced, 
the lawyer relies upon the question almost exclusively. But 
while the lawyer uses the question (presumably?) for the pur- 
pose of finding out the truth as the witness saw it, the teacher, 
in addition to this use, uses it as an instrument to lead the child 
to discover truth for himself. 

The fundamental purpose of the question is to lead the 
child to think for himself. The teacher has a purpose in mind 
in asking the question, a motive or aim. Inevitably the ques- 
tion, as a series of related words expressive of associated ideas, 
has a form. And, finally, the question provokes some kind of 
thinking on the part of the pupils. The following classifica- 
tion of questions, while pretending only to helpfulness and not 



152 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

to completeness, and not meaning to exclude other helpful ways 
ol considering the subject, is based upon an analysis of ques- 
tions actually used in classes, and also shows the close interre- 
lation of the classification made. 



1. On the basis of their form: — 

(a) Direct and indirect. 

(b) Leading. 

(c) Elliptical. 

(d) Alternative. 

2. The teacher's purpose in asking the question: — 

(a) Testing. 

(b) Pivotal and developing. 

(c) Clarifying, mystifying. 

(d) Guiding — sign-board. 

3. The kind of thinking demanded by them: — 

(a) Natural. 

(x) Contiguity. 
(y) Similarity. 

(b) Causal. 

(c) Logical. 

1. On the basis of form. 

(a) Take such questions as these : Can the snake crawl? Does 
your father work in the shoe factory? Did you tell your mother 
about itf Was Washington the first president of our country? 
Would you like to know how new varieties of 'potatoes are secured? 
Such questions are very common in our schoolrooms and have 
a common characteristic — they can be answered by yes or no. 
Such questions are called direct questions, for the reason just 
given. In some cases there is a doubt in the child's mind as to 
the answer desired. In such cases he can surely get the right 
answer by two guesses. 

i See Landon's The Art of Questioning; DeGarmo's Interest and Education. 
pp. 179-304; Hinsdale's Art of Study, pp. 97-100, for other treatments of this 
subject. 



THE RECITATION 153 

It is, however, an easy matter to state the pedagogical 
objections to such questions. First, they offer an inducement 
to guessing; second, the children soon become skillful in know- 
ing, from the teacher's voice and attitude, the answer desired, 
so that practically the teacher does all the thinking and the pupils 
agree with him; third, they require from the child a response 
which is too brief and too limited to be properly educative; 
fourth, as a consequence of the above, they are often destructive 
of interest. 

The only defenses of this form of questioning are: the 
teacher uses the direct question in order to progress rapidly over 
what the children already know so that the new may be the 
sooner reached (but this ignores the value of the child's expres- 
sion of what he knows) ; the teacher uses the direct question to 
get the child to take a position about which it is desired to ques- 
tion him later. To illustrate the last case: "Could you now be 
elected to the United States Senate?" "No." "Why?" "The 
Constitution provides, etc." The thing desired is to find if the 
pupil knows the provision of the Constitution regarding the 
qualifications of those who may be elected senators. To achieve 
this end, the following questions seem better suited. "Why 
could you not become a member of the senate ? " "What would 
prevent your election to the senate?" It may be objected that 
the child does not know the facts implied in these questions. If 
this be true, no matter what form of question be used, the facts 
must be taught before further progress is made; hence, in such 
a case, nothing is lost by the latter form of questioning. 

In opposition to the direct question, we have the indirect 
—one which can not be answered by yes or no, but which re- 
quires for its answer the formation of a judgment. Taking for 
illustration the questions already given, we can easily put them 
into the indirect form. . 

"How does the snake get from one place to another?' 

"Where does your father work?" 

"What did you tell vour mother about this matter?" 



L54 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

"What did your mother say when you told her about it?" 
"Who was the first president of our country?" 
"How are new varieties of potatoes secured?" 
These indirect questions require the pupil to form a judg- 
ment, and, if the formation of complete sentences be insisted 
upon, lead, also, to habits of complete language expression. Of 
course, the pupil may not be able to answer these questions, 
which merely indicates that he does not know, but it does not 
show that the form of the question is at fault. Certain of the 
indirect questions which demand the literal reproduction of the 
book, may be called textbook questions; for example: — The 
geography says, "The interior of the earth is in a state of igneous 
fusion." The teacher may ask, "In what condition is the in- 
terior of the earth?" The form of the question is not open to 
objection, but when it is seen that questions in this form demand, 
of the child a reproduction of words contiguously associated, 
and that this contiguous association (verbal) may not have the 
desired ideas back of it, the real basis of objection to the 
habitual use of such questions becomes apparent. And this 
reasoning may easily be extended to condemn the habitual 
use of map questions, questions at the bottom of the history 
page, the catechism and all its blood relatives, as well as set 
questions on the text made out and used year after year by 
high school, normal school, college, or university teachers. The 
dangers of verbalism are reduced, but not wholly absent, in 
schools above the elementary grades. The indirect question, 
therefore, from the standpoint of its form, is a desirable 
question. 

(b) The outline excludes the leading question from both the 
direct and indirect forms for the reason that the leading question 
suggests by its form the answer desired. For illustration : — "You 
get my point, don't you?" "Then we are in substantial agree- 
ment, aren't we?" "You had never realized this before, had 
you?" In courts of law the leading question is tabooed because 
its free use practically amounts to the lawyer's testifying. It 



THE RECITATION 155 

should be ruled out of the schoolroom for a similar reason, viz., 
it signifies that the teacher, not the pupil, does the greater part 
of the thinking. 1 

(e) The question may, however, take the elliptical form, leav- 
ing merely a word or a phrase to be supplied by the children. 
For example: — "Three sevens are — ?" "After leaving Boston 

Washington started for ?" The children, either singly or 

m concert, reply with a single word or phrase, making a sort of 
solo and chorus effect, or a duet by teacher and pupils. In 
class reviews and concert drills this form of question is often very 
useful, but its utility is practically exhausted in the uses men- 
tioned. The chief objections to it are that it provokes too small 
a reaction on the part of the child for the maximum educative 
effect, and that it tests contiguous association chiefly. 

(d) Closely allied with the elliptical question is that form of 
question known as the alternative question, one which allows a 
choice between alternatives presented in the question. For ex- 
ample:— "Is able an adjective or an adverb?" "Does the predi- 
cate of this sentence add an idea to the subject, or merely unfold 
what is already in the subject?" "Does the Amazon River 
flow east or west?" "Will Clark go from Kaskaskia to Vin- 
cennes or back to Virginia?" The psychological objection to 
such questions is that they limit the associative processes to the 
conditions specified in the questions themselves, and this limita- 
tion, while it decreases the chances of error, minimizes the educa- 
tive effect of the possible associations. If questions are used 
for the purpose of finding out what the child knows, the alter- 
native question is not so effective as other forms of the indirect 
question. If, on the contrary, the purpose be to teach the child 
a new thing (except in cases of logical or causal necessity, as 
"Does the revolution of the earth around the sun, or the inclina- 
tion of the earth's axis to the plane of its orbit, cause the changes 
of seasons?) some other form of question is preferable. To 

i It is strange how unconsciously the teacher can get into the habitual 
use of the leading question. 



156 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

illustrate the last point: — You wish the child to learn where Clark 
will go from Kaskaskia. Ask these questions: "Who are the 
people Clark wishes to capture?" "If there are any of these 
people in this part of the country, where will they be found?" 
"When Clark knows that his enemies are at Vincennes, what 
will he do?" Or, the end may be reached another way. Tell 
the children that Clark learned from a French friend that 
Hamilton had only about eighty men at Vincennes, and then 
ask what Clark will decide to do. 

It is not contended that the alternative form of question may 
not have high utility if skillfully used, but rather that few teach- 
ers have the skill to use it effectively; and, further, that its effec- 
tiveness may in almost all cases be realized through the use of 
some other forms of the indirect question. And, finally, unless 
the alternative question be skillfully used, there is danger that 
it will become, practically, a leading question or will encourage 
guessing by the children. 

Summing up, we see that (1) direct and leading questions 
are to be avoided because they guide the child too much, do his 
thinking for him, or call forth too brief a response ; (2) the ellip- 
tical and alternative questions have a very limited use for test- 
ing and for teaching purposes; (3) the indirect question is 
usually the most effective one for the teacher to use. 

2. On the basis of the teacher's purpose. 

The conclusions just stated have implied that the real 
ground of objection to the form of questions is found outside 
their form. The teacher should use the question as a tool or 
instrument, that is, he should have a definite purpose in mind to 
be achieved through the use of the question Taking all pos- 
sible questions, they may be classified on the basis of the 
teacher's purpose in asking them. 

(a) One great use of the question is to find out what the child 
knows ; or, more technically, what the child is at any time. This 
is a legitimate purpose, but can never be the whole purpose of 
the teacher. Suppose the children have been developing the 



THE RECITATION 157 

story of Robinson Crusoe. Before they go on with the new lesson, 
it is advantageous to have them reproduce what has been pre- 
viously constructed so that they may the better understand the 
new. Or, take a history class in a University. The weekly papers 
or reports, the hour, mid-year, and final examinations are only 
so many tests of what knowledge the pupil has made his own. 
If our view as to the importance of reactive behavior is correct, 
the testing of the child's knowledge has a beneficent influence 
and is a learner's right. But, granting the utility of the testing 
question, what form should it assume? Evidently the more 
complete reaction is the more educative; hence, the direct, 
elliptical and alternative questions have little value as testing 
questions, because they do not require that the pupil originate 
the judgment which is necessary to their answer. The leading 
question, which does not demand any thinking by the child, is 
excluded entirely. This throws the teacher back upon the in- 
direct question for testing purposes, but the so-called textbook 
question is to avoided. 

(6) The teacher frequently uses the question, however, as an 
instrument for organizing the child's self in new directions, for 
teaching something new. The question used for this purpose 
is called the developing question. Most young teachers, when 
they leave off asking book questions, think they are developing 
if only they ask questions which can not be answered in the words 
of the book; and they usually overwork the direct question. It is 
evident that the direct and leading questions are not advantageous. 
It is clear, also, that the elliptical and alternative questions have 
only a relatively small value for the purpose of developing a new 
thought in the child's mind. The indirect form is the one of 
greatest value, because the child in answering it must put a sub- 
ject and predicate together for himself. 

Indirect, however, does not mean indefinite. The greatest 
difficulty experienced by young teachers in forming questions is 
just this difficulty of getting indirect questions that are also 
definite enough for developing purposes. The source of this 



158 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

difficulty lies in the fact that the teacher either overestimates the 
knowledge of the pupil or else does not look at the subject from 
the child's point of view. 

This difficulty may be illustrated: — Suppose a fourth grade 
class is studying about Daniel Boone's escape from the Indians. 
The teacher asks the following questions: — "Why does Boone 
desire to escape from the Indians?" "When will he plan to 
escape ?" "In what direction will he probably go ?" "How will 
he get across the Ohio River?" The trouble is that some of 
these questions are too indefinite, and not that they have the 
wrong form. From such a development, however, the pupils 
could give only a mediocre reproduction. Note the effect of 
recalling past experiences and giving facts as bases for 
reasoning: — 

I. How has Boone felt about his family and friends since he 
has been with the Indians ? What had the Indians forced Boone 
to do for them? How has he felt about his treatment by the 
Indians ? Tell why Boone desires to get away from the Indians. 

II. When Boone went hunting alone what did he do with 
the bullets ? Why ? If you were in Boone's place, what plans 
would you make to get away ? At what time of the year would 
you start and why? Tell what plans Boone made to get away 
from the Indians. 

III. Boone has escaped now. To what place does he wish 
to go? Walk in the direction Boone traveled. What will the 
Indians do when Boone does not return to them at nightfall? 
How will Boone plan to throw the Indians off his trail ? (Tell 
some of the things he did if the pupils do not contribute them.) 
Tell what Boone did when he got away from the Indians ? 

IV. If Boone continues on his journey to what river will he 
come? How will he get across this river? (Swim. He can 'to 
Make a raft. He hasn't any logs or an axe. Suppose he had 
an axe, why would he not wish to chop with it? Hunt for a 
boat.) Tell what difficulties Boone had in crossing the Ohio 
river. 



THE RECITATION 159 

V. Now tell: — (1) Why did Boone want to get away from 
the Indians ? (2) What plans Boone made for his escape ? (3) 
What Boone did to get away from the Indians ? (4) What diffi- 
culties Boone had in getting across the Ohio River? 

The difference between the two treatments is that the second 
secures more definite thinking because of the emphasis it places 
upon past related experiences, and because it always — even by 
telling, if necessary — supplies the basis of necessary facts. One 
teacher conceives the questions as following closely the chron- 
ological sequence of Boone's activity; the other conceives them 
as steps in the development of the children's images — steps 
which are not limited by the chronological sequence. The four 
questions given under V. are pivotal questions — questions 
which determine the order of procedure and have clustering 
about them other questions whose answers are necessary to the 
answers of the four. The treatment shows that each pivotal 
question follows after a cluster of others which lead up to it. 
These pivotal questions the teacher should conceive clearly, and 
then ask the questions which develop the answers to them. The 
difference may also be expressed by saying that one teacher con- 
ceives the subject matter as homogeneous while the other con- 
ceives it as made up of organically related parts. Practice with 
children and thorough mastery of the subject matter are necessary 
to skill in the use of questions of this kind. 

The pivotal question is the one for the teacher to seize upon 
in preparation for teaching the new. The developing questions 
have to be adapted to the past related experiences and to the 
responses of the children in the class, and so can not well be made 
out fully in advance. Wandering from the subject, frequent in 
so-called developing work, is largely due to the fact that the 
teacher does not conceive the subject as made up of organically 
related pivotal parts, hanging firmly together and having a def- 
inite sequence, and to the inability of the teacher to use the 
child's past related experiences for developing purposes. There 
are thus two things essential to all successful oral teaching, viz., 



160 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(1) a clear and firm grasping of the new in its organic or pivotal 
aspects; (2) a process of successively developing these aspects 
by supplying knowledge and by the use of questions which, based 
upon the past experiences of the children, lead them to construct, 
or create, the new. Properly to grasp the new in its organic 
aspects, requires such a knowledge and mastery of the subject 
that text-books are not needed, and a sympathetic appreciation 
of the child's attitude toward the subject. 

Over and beyond these things there is an indefinable sort of 
common sense, logical ability, sense of fitness, resourcefulness, 
tact, intuition — call it what you will — a something that brings 
the teacher into an appreciative divination of the suitable and 
effective arrangement of the subject matter. This latter ele- 
ment is largely an unconscious affair, and seems to depend upon 
one's general ability and resourcefulness rather than upon any 
special knowledge which one has gained. The leading of the 
child to this view of the subject by questioning is almost a fine 
art in itself. For the highest success in this development work, 
the teacher needs to know his pupils thoroughly — their home 
life, their games, the things they enjoy most, their ways of esti- 
mating things, their schoolroom life — in short, the teacher needs 
to know the possible interpretative attitudes of the child. This 
knowledge of the individual pupil is neither statistical nor static. 
And, finally, the teacher must, by critical experience, become 
skillful in utilizing the most effective of the possible interpre- 
tative attitudes of the child. But since children differ widely 
in this respect, he must conduct his development in such a way 
that each pupil in the class constructs the new for himself. 

(c) Despite the efforts of the teacher, it is highly probable that 
some pupil in the class will not be quite clear about the new thing. 
In such cases the teacher uses questions to clarify the pupil's 
knowledge. Such questions may clarify or mystify the child's 
thought. The result will depend upon the relation of the ques- 
tion to the child's previous experiences. In order to clarify, the 
teacher should see just what is clouded. To illustrate: — A 



THE RECITATION 101 

psychology pupil one day said that she could not understand 
the experimental proof 1 that the occipital lobe is the centre for 
vision. Questioning revealed that "galvanizing the cortex" was 
the cloud. The girl had lived in a town in which iron is galvan- 
ized. Electrical stimulation of the cortex was explained, and 
Galvani's experiment was described. Ninety-four others in the 
same class had given the correct meaning to the phrase in ques- 
tion, but this girl had heard only of Voltaic electricity in her high 
school work in physics. It is thus possible for a teacher in try- 
ing to develop a point to use a term which mystifies a pupil. And 
so in efforts to clarify the teacher should first find the cause of 
the shadow; and use, for this purpose, the clarifying question. 
This illustration shows how teaching a subject clarifies one's 
ideas about it, for in teaching it, he is forced to see it from the 
unclouded side in order to present it to others. 

(d) Closely allied with the clarifying question is the guiding 
question, the sign-board question. A teacher once asked for an 
illustration of this kind of question, and in reply was asked, 
What is a sign-board? He reflected and replied, "A sign-board 
tells the way to a given destination." And what is the purpose 
of a sign-board question? "The purpose of a sign-board ques- 
tion is to show the pupil how to reach the end desired." These 
questions guided the teacher into the right thought and appre- 
ciation of questions of this class. The guiding question gives a 
hint as to the location of the answer, but does not give the answer. 
In directing seat work the teacher often needs to use questions 
of this kind. Some teachers feel that these questions have ex- 
actly the same purpose as the clarifying questions. With such 
there can be no quarrel, for the teacher's purpose determines to 
which one of the classes here specified it really belongs. Again 
let it be stated that this analysis of the question on the basis of 
the teacher's purpose is designed to be helpful rather than scien- 
tifically exhaustive. 
Summing up: — 
1 Given in James' Briefer Course, p. 110. 



162 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

I. The question may be used by the teacher: — (a) to test 
the pupil's knowledge, or the present organization of self; (b) to 
lead the child to the construction of new knowledge, or to a 
desired organization of self; (c) to clarify the child's ideas; or 
(d) to guide the child into the desired way of thinking so that he 
may help himself. 

II. All these purposes are legitimate ones, and testing and 
developing are complementary phases of the teaching process; 
hence, neither should displace the other in the teacher's estima- 
tion or practice. 

III. The indirect form of the question is generally the most 
efficient in the realization of the legitimate purposes of the teacher. 

IV. Efficient use of questions demands that: — (a) the 
teacher know and utilize the most effective of the child's possible 
interpretative attitudes; (b) the teacher know the subject 
matter in its organic aspects; (c) the teacher's questions 
shall lead the child to the free grasping of the organic aspects of 
the subject. 

3. On the basis of the kind of thinking demanded to answer 
the questions. 

One must not overlook the child's mind in this analysis, 
for after all, the conclusions already reached, as to the form of 
questions and the teacher's purpose in using them, are subject 
to revision or even rejection if they are inconsistent with the edu- 
cative activity of the child's mind. In fact, these analyses have 
been made with the idea of maximizing the teacher's teaching 
effectiveness, or, in equivalent language, maximizing the child's 
learning, for effectiveness of teaching can have no meaning apart 
from increased and improved learning. In the following dis- 
cussion of questions on the basis of the thought-sequence de- 
manded of the pupil by them, the discussion will keep within 
well-defined and well-known psychological laws. Trivial ques- 
tions will not be treated here, for it is now assumed that the 
questions propounded have the best form for the realization 
of the teacher's purpose. 



THE RECITATION 163 

The child's thinking activity will be stimulated in different 
ways by the various questions asked him. His thought may 
follow the so-called natural laws of association, contiguity and 
similarity, or it may follow a causal sequence, or a logical 
sequence. These will now be examined in detail. 

(a) NATURAL THINKING. 

Suppose a child has learned about Boone's escape from the 
Indians, and that the questions already given (see p. 159) are 
asked: — What sort of thinking must the child perform in order 
to answer those questions? Notice that the facts have been 
given in a continuous series; if he has grasped them at all they 
lie in his mind in a connected series in the same order in which 
they were given. In the development of those points, thinking 
by similarity and causal connection was prominent; under the 
stimulus of these questions the child re-thinks his connected 
series of thoughts. This cannot be described wholly as associa- 
tion by contiguity. Of course, it is remembered experience, and 
the order of ideas depends largely upon temporal contiguity. 
Contrast this reproduction with that of trying to remember the 
words of a book or the words of a poem. There is a difference 
due to the richer context of remembered experience in the 
former case. 

But suppose that the preparation for the study of the tables 
of English money is being carried on: — the following questions 
might be asked: — Who of you have seen a piece of English 
money? Describe it. To whom did this money belong? How 
many of you have relatives who used to live in England? In 
such questions as these the association, or memory, is chiefly 
contiguous. The question, Where have you seen Shepherd' s- 
purse- growing? demands memory of spatial contiguity. In gen- 
eral, all testing questions tend to take this form. They may, 
however, be in some other form and the most effective ones 
usually are. The real question is, How does the child think in 
response to questions demanding contiguity ? In the first place, 



164 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

such questions demand that the child recall his past experiences. 
In the second place, this contiguous past experience has very 
little meaning which depends to any considerable extent upon 
the fact of its contiguity. Time and space are very fundamental 
and primitive ideas upon which, as beads on a string, past experi- 
ences are strung, but re-thinking things by contiguity in time 
and space series is not very educative. In fact, psychologists 
hold 1 that those minds in which contiguous thinking predomi- 
nates are proverbially dull and prosaic. 

The time-worn topic for school compositions, "What I saw 
as I came to school and what it was doing," soon loses its charm 
for children chiefly because it demands mere contiguity, with 
the context and chief elements of meaning omitted. A colored 
boy expressed this contempt in his composition, which was: — 
"I never saw nothin'. It wasn't doing anythin'." Much of the 
indifference of boys to grammatical definitions and rules is due 
to the fact that these things have nothing but the elements of 
contiguity in them for the boys. So, also, tables of weights and 
measures are often of little interest to girls. That is, mere sym- 
bols, if remembered at all, must be associated by contiguity. 
Rhythm is of great value in such cases, and many persons remem- 
ber that "singing the capitals" and singing "the multiplication 
tables" relieved the tedium of many an otherwise weary hour. 
It has been noted, too, that children in reading things too diffi- 
cult for them use the sing-song as an aid, and no doubt, in some 
cases, the swaying of the body is a source of real pleasure to 
children. Therefore, when the teacher's questions demand 
association by contiguity, the children lose interest, and the in- 
struction becomes wooden and lifeless. This is why textbook 
memorizing is so dull, lifeless, and soul destroying. 

The fundamental truth is that the contiguity series as such 
has the minimum of meaning for the child. In reply to this, it 
may be urged, as it has been urged in the past, that since chil- 
dren soon get control of contiguity series, and since they like to 

i James' Talks to Teachers, p. 81. 



THE RECITATION 165 

do what they can do well, children like to repeat the contiguity 
series they have learned to control. This is the proverbial testi- 
mony of schoolmasters as opposed to school teachers. The mas- 
ters insist that children love to decline Latin nouns whose mean- 
ings they do not at all comprehend. Boys have been known to 
band together to build tree-houses, boats, or telephone systems 
during vacation, but not to study Latin or even English gram- 
mar. One class of things appeals to the expanding life-interests 
of the child while the other does not, and consequently the for- 
mer class of things is sought after by the child. 

The original answer to this position is true, however, within 
certain limitations. Young children love jingles and connected 
series and do derive pleasure from their mere repetition. This 
seems to be Nature's way of unconsciously building up habit 
and skill in the child. All must admit the danger of barrenness 
in habitual routine, and must be willing, therefore, to avoid that 
extreme use of contiguity which tends to the form of parrot-like, 
mechanical reproduction. 

There is one exception to this position which should be 
stated frankly. Certain symbols and combinations of symbols 
should become so thoroughly habitual that the context of remem- 
bered experience sinks to the minimum. The facts of addition, 
subtraction, multiplication, the squares and cubes of certain 
numbers, aliquot parts, the spelling of certain (not all) words 
should drop all intermediary steps and move rapidly, accurately, 
and mechanically through the series. 

Meaning and significance begin to appear when, in spite of 
the space and time relations of things, the child begins to con- 
nect them together because of aspects of internal identity. This 
implies reproduction, discrimination, comparison, judgment, 
even reasoning in its primitive forms. It is thus evident that 
thinking by similarity means more significant self-activity than 
is implied in contiguity. In contiguity one is limited to things 
as they have actually occurred; in similarity the mind begins to 
build up a world for itself. The fact that a certain minimum 



166 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

of contiguity is the necessary basis for similarity should not be 
overlooked. Let us suppose that there are two contiguity 
series : 

a, b, c, d, e, etc., and 

a, b', c , d', e , etc., in which the elements are alike in 
some respects. According to contiguity a has only one asso- 
ciate, b; by similarity, a may suggest a, and then by contiguity, 
b', and b' , by similarity, may suggest b. Similarity, combined 
as it always is with contiguity, renders one's past experiences 
flexible, and flexibility means serviceableness for the mind's own 
ends. The ideal element in thinking first appears in thinking 
by similarity. 

This analysis of thinking by similarity should convince 
teachers of the desirability of stimulating and encouraging it in 
children, and should also make it evident that thinking by simi- 
larity can not be secured by the use of certain devices well known 
to them. The textbook with questions at the bottom of the 
page leads the child to thinking by contiguity. So, too, the 
"textbook question" — the one that demands the reproduction 
of the words of the book — demands very little beyond bare con- 
tiguity. Of course, pupils may do some thinking by similarity 
even in the cases cited above; but they do it in spite of the influ- 
ence of the teacher and not because of it. The teacher should 
lead the child to think by similarity and the so-called "higher 
forms of thinking." 

. The question at issue, then, is simply this: — How may the 
teacher stimulate the pupil to thinking by similarity? 

(1) All oral preparation for a lesson about to be assigned 
consists in calling up in the pupil's mind certain ideas in terms 
of which the new ideas may be interpreted. This process pre- 
pares the pupil for thinking by similarity as he studies. If this 
assignment includes some parts of the new, the teacher can note 
the extent to which his pupils actually utilize similarity. This 
is simply a restatement of the principle of apperception, a prin- 
ciple valid for ideas but not for words. 



THE RECITATION 1G7 

(2) The questioning in the class should be of such a char- 
acter as to demand thinking by similarity. Class questions 
should lead pupils to form new associations on the basis of like- 
ness to what is already known. In the recitation, what the child 
has learned should be organized, and organization of knowledge 
is impossible without a basis of similarity. Thinking by simi- 
larity may also be stimulated by having pupils freely illustrate, 
whenever possible, and by means of their own personal exper- 
iences, the things they have learned. 

(3) Comparison is essentially a process of thinking by simi- 
larity, for, after all, it is only one phase of apperception. After 
two similar things have Deen compared, each is interpreted in 
light of its essential aspects, and both are tied together by the 
discovered bonds of similarity. Therefore, the teacher who 
makes a large and wise use. of comparison is stimulating the 
pupils to think by similarity. 

(4) In a broad way, the teacher who has constantly in mind 
the ideal of stimulating the self-activity of the child will inevitably 
rise above the demands of contiguity. The activity of the mind 
in contiguous thinking lacks that freedom which is character- 
istic of any worthy self-activity. In short a teacher who regards 
the end of education as formation rather than information will 
almost unconsciously tend away from contiguity and toward 
similarity. 

(b) CAUSAL THINKING. 

Things cohere; they are tied together in various ways. If 
any one fact A is always followed by a related fact B, A is said 
to be the cause of B and B is the effect of A. Invariable sequence 
is one aspect of causal connection. But invariable sequence 
is almost exclusively a matter of both spatial and temporal 
sequence. Hence, contiguity is a basis without which causal 
thinking could not exist. Causal connection also has a basis 
in similarity for we think of the effect as being, in a way, identical 
with the cause; the effect is the cause in another garb. To illus- 



168 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

trate: — The tension in the spring of a watch is the cause of its 
running; its running is just this tension in another form. One's 
motion in winding a watch causes a tension in the spring. The 
tension in the spring is simply this motion in another form. The 
sound made by the watch, the movement of the wheels and 
hands, the heat developed by the friction, etc., are simply so 
many forms or effects of one's motions in winding the watch. 
Any causal fact has this peculiarity — it is tied to the whole system 
of things, past, present, and future. And by tracing out these 
manifold connections one comes to apprehend the causal fact 
more accurately and definitely. 

Thus far mention has been made of natural causation, a 
causal series tied-in with the objective world. There is also a 
realm of subjective causation, a causal series tied-in with human 
motives. One asks a friend, "Why did you go to the peach 
country last summer?" and the reply is, "I went because I 
wished to know the details of peach raising and because I 
thought it would be great fun to loaf in such a busy land." Here 
the cause, or reason, for a given human act is expressed in terms 
of human motive. The motive bears the same relation to the 
action that the winding of a watch bears to the tension of the 
spring — it is the that-without-which the going to the peach coun- 
try would not have occurred as truly as the winding of the watch 
is the that-without-which there would be no tension in the spring. 
It must be frankly admitted, however, that the connection of 
this subjective causal fact to the whole realm of one's motives 
is not as clear as is the connection of a given objective causal 
fact to the whole system of force and matter. 

There are, then, two kinds of causal connection, viz., object- 
ive casual series and subjective causal series. 1 Nature study and 
science deal with objective facts and objective causal relations, 
while all studies that relate to man deal with subjective facts, 
subjective causal series, and their realization in objective forms. 

i Ultimately, both are subjective for there is no objective causal series 
for one except as he thinks it. This metaphysical view, however, is not 
essential to the discussion here to be taken up. 



THE RECITATION 169 

A further distinction must be noted. The effect which in- 
variably follows the motive is a visible tangible thing. One's 
going to the peach country is a thing actually occurring in space 
and time and, therefore, as truly open to the observation of 
others as is the running of a watch. The cause of one's going is 
an invisible something, a motive which no microscope w 7 ould 
reveal as either a dynamic or static brain condition, although 
there was undoubtedly a brain process connected therewith. 
The tension in the watch spring can not be seen either, for all 
force is invisible. 

The above discussion should make it clear (1) that the 
effect, or result, is concrete, and (2) that cause is abstract. Or, 
to state it differently, cause, genetically considered, is an infer- 
ence from sense-contact experience. Therefore, in the process 
of his development, the child apprehends effects before he com- 
prehends causes. The child's questions show this. "Why does 
the dog bark ? " " What makes the car go ? " " Why did you do 
that?" All such questions show that the child is seeking the 
invisible, intangible cause which he believes lies back of the 
visible, tangible world of his sense-experience. Adults desire 
the same kind of evidence. People wish to see the X-Ray ma- 
chine, the experiments with liquid air, the mechanism of wire- 
less telegraphy in order that their ideas of these forces may be 
made definite and clear. In other w^ords, so that inference may 
rest upon sense-contact experience. 

On the basis of his experiences the child's notions of how 
certain objects affect him become definite and interesting. Espe- 
cially with respect to objects that are conceived by the child as 
possibly sources of harm, he asks, "What will it do to me?" 
"What will it do to you ?" In all such cases the child is seeking 
to learn in advance of actual experience the effects one shomd 
look for as a result of contact with certain things. 

It is evident, from what has thus far been set forth, that the 
child is fitted to think from effect to cause before he is fitted to 
to think from cause to effect. This fact is of significance to 



170 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

teachers. The nature study work in the first grades should be 
observational and inferential rather than experimental. The 
child should be led to an appreciation of causes through their 
effects, and not to an appreciation of effects through their causes. 
Again, the first study of subjects that deal with Human motives 
should proceed from actions to motives. Power to interpret 
history in its causal relations can be built up only on the basis 
of inferential interpretation of human actions into equivalent 
motives. So, too, geography taught by the physiographic ideal 
and method demands that children think prevailingly from cause 
to effect instead of from effect to cause. 

In striving to induce causal thinking in pupils the teacher 
should distinguish the two kinds noted in the last paragraph. If 
one is striving to secure thinking from effect to cause, he should 
ask, "Why is it so?" or "Why did Grant march toward Jackson 
rather than toward Vicksburg?" The whole matter is really 
very simple. The pupils have already observed or know a given 
fact that has an antecedent cause. A question that leads the 
pupil's mind to connect this fact or result with its cause is all 
that is needed; and such a question is a simple indirect question 
with a why in it. 

If, however, one wishes the pupil to think from cause to 
effect, there must be (1) a clear grasping of the force or motive, 
and (2) a question that leads the pupil imaginatively to project 
this force into its probable effects. "What will Pemberton do 
when he learns that Grant is marching toward Vicksburg?" 
"What will be the effect on a pasture of a large number of sheep 
grazing there?" "W T hat will be the effect of allowing the water 
to freeze in the rock crevices?" All these questions are of this 
type, "What will be the effect of this cause?" 

Having now seen the essential nature of causal thinking 
and the character of the questions that stimulate pupils to it, a 
few considerations as to the broader aspects of causal thinking 
as related to the work of the elementary school will be offered. 

(1) Exclusive memory work tends to destroy causal think- 



THE RECITATION 171 

ing and yet memory is the necessary basis of causal thinking. 
The paradox is easily resolved. 

(a) If we have correctly analyzed causal thinking, it rests, 
in part, upon a recognition of invariable sequence; and this in- 
variable sequence is possible only as sequences are remembered 
as invariable. One must remember the content of his experi- 
ences rather than their form to have the right basis for causal 
thinking. And, hence, memory is the necessary basis of causal 
thinking. 

(b) Memory work, however, centres attention upon the 
form of an experience rather than upon its content. This leads 
to a satisfaction with "what the book says," or with "what the 
teacher says." All this satisfaction with things as they are, 
accepting them as simple, ultimate facts, is directly opposed to 
that dissatisfaction which forever seeks to comprehend the causal 
antecedents and the causal consequents of any given fact. 

(2) Causal thinking may be stimulated by arousing the 
pupil's curiosity. Teachers frequently seem so anxious for 
their pupils to know that they hasten to tell them all or to refer 
them to books wherein they may find everything needful. The 
gap between the desire to know and the actual knowing may 
safely be widened provided the pupil is constantly alert and 
active in his effort to find out. This throwing of the burden of 
finding out for himself back upon the pupil, if done with discre- 
tion, increases his interest and stimulates his curiosity. Curios- 
ity is an active going out after something, and, of course, may 
relate to things that are causally connected. If one is curious 
as to how the colon ( :) came to be used as a sign of an indicated 
ratio, he may indeed find out, but will probably not find out why 
it was done. In all arbitrary conventional things there is no 
why; there is only fact; simply the fact that it is thus and so. But 
one may also arouse the child's curiosity regarding things or 
facts that have causal connections, as, for example, "Why was 
Grant anxious to get his army below Vicksburg?" "Why is 
loam more fertile than sand?" "W T hy does a melted fragment 



172 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

of lead assume a spherical form as it falls from the top of a shot- 
tower ?" If by such questions the teacher can arouse the pupil's 
curiosity and thus get him to find the cause, he renders the pupil 
a genuine service. 

(3) Also, if one can induce him to suspend his judgment 
until his observations take on the feeling of certitude, the child 
will be stimulated to causal thinking. But besides influencing 
the child to suspend his judgment, the teacher should also influ- 
ence him to make it. It is said that "a liar needs a good mem- 
ory"; and so does the teacher, but for a very different reason. 
If a pupil is assigned a problem to think out, the teacher should 
not forget to give him an opportunity to report upon it. In 
short, the teacher should endeavor, both by getting the child to 
suspend his judgment and also by getting him to keep at it 
until he finally makes it, to influence the child to causal thinking. 

(4) In this matter of stimulating causal thinking the teacher 
may become efficient by organizing and presenting his subjects 
according to the principle of causal connection. This causal 
organization is not an easy task. The chief difficulties are: — 
(1) an inability on the part of the teacher to see these causal con- 
nections, and (2) an inability to organize a subject or topic 
according to them after they have been seen. The first is simply 
lack of power — due, in most cases, to the way one has been 
taught; the second is the lack of skill, due to an absence of inde- 
pendence in thinking. Teachers are too dependent upon the 
order in which things are found in books or in which they have 
been learned. Even when pupils study a textbook, the recita- 
tion should largely be a reorganization of the materials studied 
in order that the pupils may more permanently assimilate the 
material studied by seeing it in other relations. The simple 
repetition of things as they have been learned is usually incom- 
patible with causal thinking. 

(5) Further than this: — The teacher should believe that 
nothing is really learned until it ? is known in its causal connec- 
tions. This does not mean that the whole universe of thing; 



THE RECTTATION 173 

should be taught in every lesson; but it does mean that the 
teacher shall so teach that his pupils do not think they know all 
there is to be known about a thing when they have learned a few 
things about it. Every new thing learned should open up a 
world of things to be known. Knowledge should always be an 
incentive to further knowledge, and the teacher should so condi- 
tion the pupil who is learning that by and through his act of 
learning the thirst for knowledge is intensified. This can never 
be done, however, when the thing learned is an arbitrary or con- 
ventionalized one. If one knows how to spell cat, he knows all 
there is to know about spelling it; but when he knows that corn 
''tassels out" he is just ready to begin to know about corn. 

(c) LOGICAL THINKING. 

Turning now to the last division of the analysis, logical 
thinking and the ways by which it can be stimulated remain for 
consideration. 

The word logical gets into one's vocabulary early in life, 
and he has a feeling of its meaning long before he can, with any 
degree of precision, define, even to himself, its meaning. There 
is a why or a because in logical thinking, and thus it is identified 
with causal thinking. Logical thinking is thinking by "neces- 
sary sequence". Necessary means that it could not be other- 
wise; in the nature of things this thing must be as it is. When- 
ever the invariable sequence of causal thinking is regarded as 
necessary, it becomes logical thinking. Take a classic illustra- 
tion of the books on logic: — 

All men are mortal. 

Socrates was a man. 

Therefore, Socrates was mortal. 
Granting the truth of the first two propositions, the third is 
necessarily true, for by being a man Socrates becomes subject to 
that which is predicated of all men, viz., mortality. Take 
another illustration : — 



174 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

All cows have horns. 

This animal whose side and legs I see is a cow. 

Therefore, this animal has horns. 
The first proposition asserts that all cows have horns; the second 
that this animal is a cow. Then, necessarily, this animal has 
horns. Of course we know that some cows do not have horns; 
but, assuming the truth of the first proposition (and this we 
always do in logical thinking) this animal ijiust have horns by 
virtue of its (if one may coin a word) cowness. 

If in causal thinking one works from a general proposition 
which is assumed to be true, and examines a particular fact 
which comes under that law, he employs logical thinking. To 
illustrate: — 

All metals expand with heat. 

Lead is a metal. 

Therefore, lead expands with heat. - 
From what has been said already it is evident that, grant- 
ing the truth of the propositions given, logical thinking allows 
one to enter (or forces one to enter) into the heart of things, 
allows one to find the genuine law of things by virtue of which 
they are what they are. One school of thinkers maintains that 
by logical thinking we come to know the inner nature or essence 
of things. Another school maintains that by logical thinking 
we unfold the necessary relationships between judgments, and 
thus find the laws underlying human ways of thinking. Whether 
this "nature of things" is outside of the mind or within it need not 
disturb the teacher, for his task is to guide and stimulate logical 
thinking in the pupils, and this process is the same in either case. 
Looked at from another point of view, logical thinking simply 
renders explicit what is implicit in perception and in judgment. 
One recognizes an object as a lead pencil. How does he know 
it is a lead pencil? Simply by the following series of proposi- 
tions : — 

1. All cylindrical, wooden objects having at their centres 
a substance that makes marks upon paper are lead pencils. 



THE RECITATION 175 

2. This is a cylindrical, wooden object having at its centre 
a substance that makes marks upon paper. 

3. Therefore, this object is a lead pencil. 

It is not urged that one consciously goes through this pro- 
cess every time he perceives a pencil, but one's logical think- 
ing simply makes explicit, or evident, what was before implicit, 
or hidden in his perception. 

Take this judgment, "The man went to town," and see 
how the logical thinking is implicit in it. 

1. The performance of a series of acts, x, y, z, etc., is called 
going to town. 

2. The man performed the series of acts, x, y, z, etc. 

3. Therefore, the man went to town * 

The subjects in the elementary school course that afford 
the best opportunity for training in logical thinking will now 
be considered. 

(1) When one, in dealing with number, gets beyond the 
mere minimum of the so-called "number facts" of addition, 
subtraction, multiplication, and division, he finds the problem. 
A problem consists of two parts: — (1) a series of given relation- 
ships; and (2) a required relationship (or relationships) to be 
discovered. In the mathematical problem, the relationships to 
be discovered bear certain necessary relations to the given facts 
or relationships, and hence, logical thinking is required in the 
solution of all mathematical problems. The "example," how- 
ever, is merely an indication of certain operations to be per- 
formed. To solve a problem, therefore, is to change it into an 
example by discovering the necessary relationships of the parts 
given to the parts required. Take, for illustration, a very sim- 
ple problem: — 

"Sarah sold three dozen pears at twelve cents a dozen, and 
with the proceeds bought calico at six cents a yard; how many 
yards did she buy?" 

l A fuller discussion of the nature of this process and a graphic method 
of illustrating the necessary relationships is given in Chapter XII. 



176 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

Solutions : 

A. 1. One dozen pears sell for twelve cents. 

2. Three dozen pears sell for three times as many 
cents as one dozen. 

Therefore, three dozen pears sell for three twelves 
of cents, or thirty-six cents. 

B. 1. At one cent a yard, thirty-six cents will buy 
thirty-six yards of calico. 

2. At six cents a yard, one-sixth as many yards of 
calico can be bought as at one cent a yard. 

Therefore, at six cents a yard, one-sixth of thirty- 
six yards of calico, or six yards of calico, can be bought for 
thirty-six cents. 

Of course this problem can be solved in other ways. 
Here is one: — 

1. One dozen pears buy two yards of calico accord- 
ing to the conditions given. 

2. Three dozen pears buy three times as many yards 
of calico as one dozen pears buy. 

Therefore, three dozen pears buy three times two 

yards of calico, or six yards. 

The solutions given illustrate the way in which logical think- 
ing is involved in the solution of problems. This logical think- 
ing is very different from the kind of thinking required in master- 
ing number facts and processes. The genuine value of arithmeti- 
cal study consists in the development of the power to think 
logically. To know how to add, subtract, multiply, etc., is of 
no value except as it is connected with the knowledge of when, 
where, and why these processes are performed. And the power 
to think logically comes out of a perception of the connection 
between the relationships given and the relationships required. 
If this power arises out of the inventive activity of the pupil, it 
becomes serviceable in many situations in life. If, however, 
the power arises from an imitation of the "model analysis" it 
may take the form of a habit which has little flexibility under 



THE RECITATION l77 

conditions which are similar but not identical. This explains 
why "miscellaneous problems" cause pupils so much trouble. 

The view here expressed as to the educative value of 
arithmetical study is based on the belief that the educative 
associative act is either one of purposed discovery or of inven- 
tion. There is, it is true, a mechanical phase of arithmetic 
which must become habitual because of its serviceableness as 
a means in the solution of problems, but this mechanical phase 
should never be regarded as an end in itself, nor should teachers 
insist that pupils follow, absolutely, one set form of analysis. 
Rather, the teacher should stimulate the child to discover the 
necessary relations of the problem, to invent a way by which the 
required relations may be obtained. To do this successfully, 
the child must usually image the given conditions of the problem, 
and base his logical thinking on the image relations. Thus 
taught arithmetic becomes valuable, not only because of its serv- 
iceableness in many practical affairs of life, but also, because 
of the genuine power of attacking similar life-problems by break- 
ing them up into their necessary relationships. 

(2) Another study in the curriculum of the elementary 
school also demands logical thinking. English grammar is 
essentially a summary of the necessary relationships of words 
as used in sentences. By an examination of the functions of 
words in sentences, we find similarities. "Similarity of func- 
tion" gives rise to the so-called "parts of speech." When a 
word in a sentence is examined, we classify it by its necessary 
relationships. For illustration: — In the sentence, "The early 
bird catches the worm," early is an adjective. Why ? We imply 
the following syllogism in our answer: — 

1. A word which describes a substantive is an adjective. 

2. Early describes the substantive bird. 

3. Therefore, early is an adjective. 

The same kind of thinking is implied in what is called 
"grammatical analysis." We say of the sentence just given: — 
"This is a simple, declarative sentence of which the early bird 



178 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

is the complete subject, etc r " In the portion of the anaylsis 
given there are implicit syllogisms by which we conclude that 
(1) this is a simple sentence, (2) this is a declarative sentence, 
and (3) this sentence has as its subject the phrase the early bird. 

It was, perhaps, this character of necessary relationship in 
parsing and analysis that led men in the past to value grammar 
so highly as a study. The belief that language and grammar 
are one caused much discussion and also much dissatisfaction 
and wickedness on the part of pupils. The language one uses 
as a means of expressing his ideas to others is largely a matter 
of unconscious habit, and depends upon two things, viz., (1) 
unconscious imitation of the language of others, and (2) con- 
scious imitation of others or of a rule. Our schools have come 
to recognize that effective language habits may be acquired by 
children without a study of grammar. Grammar is the science 
of effective language, of the related uniformities which underlie 
effective oral and written language. 1 These " related uniformi- 
ties" may be defined or described in words, and thus there grows 
up a definite body of definitions, rules, and principles which is 
called grammar. Unfortunately, too, young pupils can commit 
these definitions, rules, and principles to memory, and even 
now and then catch a glimpse of what is meant by some of them. 
In consequence of these two facts, some teachers have assumed 
that the child in the fifth grade should begin to study grammar. 2 
And if pupils could by this process come to appreciate the "true 
inwardness" of language, it would, despite their protests, be an 
excellent plan to follow. 

More recently, however, many teachers have extended the 
term language lessons, so that many things formerly taught in 
grammar are now taught as language, and have restricted the 
term grammar to those related uniformities which underlie 
language. And, also, many teachers have been convinced that 

i Effective means ready and accurate in expressing or conveying one's 
thoughts, and not necessarily in leading others to agree with, the speaker or 
writer. 

2 Report of the Committee of Fifteen. 



THE RECITATION 179 

the only effective way of teaching grammar is the inductive 
method by which pupils are led to discover these related uni- 
formities for themselves. 

But, be the method one of induction or one of memory, as 
soon as the pupil begins to interpret the sentence before him, 
either by analyzing it or naming the parts of speech in it, his 
thinking (provided he be not guessing) is essentially logical 
thinking. And by means of this logical thinking, the pupil comes 
to appreciate the necessary functional aspects of the various 
elements of sentences ; he acquires the power to get the thought 
of a sentence by a rapid analysis of it. This power of inter- 
pretation, and not the ability to define, is the great end to be 
gained by and through a study of grammar. 

(3) Other studies of the school curriculum besides arith- 
metic and grammar afford occasional opportunities for logical 
thinking, but it is besides our present purpose to discuss them 
in detail, for the analyses already given will enable any teacher 
to detect such opportunities and to utilize them for the develop- 
ment of the child's power to think in terms of necessary relations. 

Taking now a retrospective glance at this long section on the 
topic, "the nature and kinds of questions" (pp. 151 — 179), we 
may summarize it by saying that (1) one's effective teaching power 
depends upon his skill in questioning; (2) the teacher by means 
of questions should endeavor to lead the child to form new 
thoughts, for by this process alone does the mind grow and 
develop; (3) there are stages in the child's thinking which re- 
quire a particular kind of questioning; and (4) effective ques- 
tions are those which require the best thinking of which the child 
is capable. 

§ 39. THE ASSIGNMENT OF WORK. 1 

So far, however, only the teaching aspect of the recitation 
has been discussed. It is desirable that pupils develop the power 
to teach themselves, or the power to get ideas by an interpretation 

i Hinsdale's Art of Study, Chapter X, pp. 78-88, has a treatment of this 
topic, 



180 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

of the symbolism of books. Pupils can gain this power only by 
doing the thing in question. And hence arises the practical 
question, What can be done by the teacher to develop in pupils 
the power of independent study ? 

It is by and through the assignment that the teacher can 
best stimulate this independent power. Primary pupils can 
do little in the way of independent study, and so teachers pro- 
vide "busy work" consisting of drawing, matching colors, paper 
cutting, mat weaving, paper folding, etc. Pupils in the inter- 
mediate grades have greater power of independent study, and 
hence have assigned to them short "lessons," which are chiefly 
and generally repetitions of certain things they have already 
learned to do, such as learning to spell certain words, writing 
out compositions, performing examples in arithmetic, etc. 
Grammar grade pupils, however, have considerable power to 
interpret symbols into equivalent ideas and so have assigned to 
them definite lessons from which by study they are to get new ideas. 

But what principles should control the assignment ? 

(a) The assignment should be something which the pupil 
by reasonable diligence can master in the available time. The 
difficulty in realizing this ideal is due to the fact that some pupils 
have greater ability than others and, hence, what can be accom- 
plished by reasonably diligent application is a variable for any 
given class. To make the assignment according to the capacity 
of those with the greatest ability means half-mastery by the 
majority and their consequent loss of interest. To assign what 
the slowest pupils can master is to leave a majority in idleness 
and in a position to push somebody into temptation or be led 
into it themselves. To assign what the average child can master 
is to overcrowd the slow and underwork the bright ones. In- 
dividual assignment is usually an impracticable thing. The 
assignment, then, should be a minimum for all and some extra 
things for those who are able to accomplish them. This plan 
is not always feasible, but it seems to be, on the whole, the best 
plan for assigning lessons. 



THE RECITATION 181 

(b) The assignment should be such that the pupil knows 
what it is all about — there should be an aim toward the reali- 
zation of which the pupil's study is directed. Very often, when 
teachers have not carefully assigned lessons, pupils fall into a 
meaningless, clock-like repetition of the words of the page; 
repetition, not thinking, is secured, and, consequently little is 
really learned. Constructive thinking in study, as in the recita- 
tion, is the only process by which the pupil learns. Aims, or ends, 
are the natural ways by which to arouse constructive thinking. 

Again, the limits of the assignment should be clearly marked. 
This is only another way of saying what has been said in the preced- 
ing paragraph, for if aims are set up, they imply definite limits. Still, 
it is worth while to insist that the assignment be extremely definite. 
If page references are given, there should beno doubt about what 
pages are included. It is worth a child's while to learn how to use 
books, but this should not be included in the ordinary assignment 
of lessons. In the study period a pupil should spend his time in 
finding out certain definite things — not in merely looking for them. 

(c) Moreover, if in the matter to be studied by pupils there 
are probable difficulties, the assignment should anticipate and 
prepare the pupils for them. It is always a loss of time and 
usually a loss of interest for pupils to encounter a difficulty 
which they are unable to master, especially in the study period. 
The resulting idleness has almost unlimited possibilities for dis- 
order. Of course pupils should learn to face difficulties and 
master them, but in this, as in other things, tact and sense are 
needed. Besides, if by a few words at the time of assignment 
the teacher can so prepare the pupil that he is able to master the 
difficulty when he encounters it in his study, the pupil gains a 
greater sense of power than by doggedly and persistently (yet 
unsuccessfully) attacking a difficulty. There is a sense of self- 
hood and of power that comes from successful achievement 
that is never born out of mere effort to succeed. A legitimate 
function of the assignment, therefore, is to prepare the pupil for 
successful achievement in his study. 



182 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(d) And, finally, the assignments should be even from day 
to day, arranged, of course, to disclose an increasing difficulty, 
commensurate with increasing power. The amount of time 
required each day in study should be practically the same. 
There may be some deviations necessary, due to the nature of 
the topic and to the degree of interest in a given topic, but as a 
rule, the amount of effort required to master an assignment 
should be uniform. 

§ 40. WHAT PUPILS SHOULD BE EXPECTED TO DO IN THEIR 
STUDY OF ASSIGNMENTS. 

In the first place, the pupil should strive to master the 
pivotal aspects of an assignment. This simply means that he 
should learn to discriminate between essentials and non-essen- 
tials. The pupil's ability to do this will depend largely upon 
the nature of the teacher's assignment. Granting, however, 
that the assignment has been well made, the pupil should strive 
to get at the heart of the matter he is studying. This means 
that he should apply himself completely. It is, after all, merely 
a matter of undivided attention, a power well worth a great 
amount of effort by both teacher and pupil. 

In the second place, the pupil should search for the rela- 
tionships between the facts given. That is, the pupil should 
reflect, think, associate ideas. Measured by this standard there 
is much that passes for study which is the merest dawdling. 

§ 41. THE RELATION OF THE RECITATION TO THE STUDY PRE- 
VIOUSLY DONE BY THE PUPILS. 

Many teachers regard the recitation merely as a period set 
apart for the reproduction by the pupils of what they have 
learned. While this may constitute a legitimate portion of 
the work of the recitation period, it can never be the ultimate 
or complete aim. The study of assignments has, as its ultimate 
object, the growth of the pupil's power to think. Therefore, 
the recitation must be conducted in such a manner as to utilize 



THE RECITATION 183 

in new ways what the pupil has learned. That is, the recitation 
period is a reorganization period following upon a study period. 
In order to make the recitation such a period, the teacher must 
have a greater knowledge of the subject than that given by the 
text studied, and he must have a power of seeing the essential 
things studied about in various ways. A skillful teacher can so 
frame his recitation questions that the pupil can make the mental 
associations demanded by them only by utilizing what he has 
already learned. This is the highest phase of the art of ques- 
tioning, viz., questioning that demands the utilization of the 
known in the effort to reach the new implied in the question. 
The pupil's power to think, to reflect, to form new associations, 
to reach new truth for himself — this is the test of successful 
teaching and of worthy learning. All else is chaff, sound, foam. 

§ 42. THE RELATION OF THE PROBLEM TO TEACHING. 

After all these analyses, descriptions, explanations, and 
arguments, we are in a position to see that, for the teacher, the 
one central problem of the recitation is how best to stimulate the 
constructive thinking of the pupils of the class; how induce in 
them, the most educative self -activity . And it has been seen that 
what is called self-activity or constructive thinking is not in 
any way like "spontaneous generation;" rather, constructive 
thinking is a process which reaches the new by utilizing the 
related old — a process of moving from given conditions or rela- 
tions to required conditions or relations. Constructive think- 
ing is the process which solves problems. And hence, to stim- 
ulate constructive thinking in the pupils, the teacher should rely 
upon the problem. A teacher cannot educate the pupil; one's 
own effort is the only thing that educates him. All the teacher 
can do is to set up an environment that will stimulate the pupil 
to truly educative effort. And teachers need to realize that 
their most efficient instrument in stimulating the self-activity 
of pupils is the question which, for the pupil, is, essentially, a 
problem. 



CHAPTER X. 

Realism and Symbolism in School Work, or the Relation 
of Thought to Expression. 

In the preceding chapters on Discipline and The Recitation, 
there have been many references to the relations which exist 
between thought and expression, and to realism and symbolism 
as they are related to school work. The far-reaching influence 
of a correct understanding of these things warrants a special 
treatment of them. 

§ 43. WHAT IS MEANT BY REALISM AND BY SYMBOLISM IN 
TEACHING. 

Previous analyses have paved the way for a clear appre- 
hension of what is meant by the terms realism and symbolism. 
Reality is one's consciousness, his mental processes, the actual 
associates of an idea, his meanings. Realism in teaching means 
that the teacher's effort is to induce in pupils this mental reality. 
This thought-getting by the pupil is the teacher's greatest con- 
cern. While reality is subjective, it is believed to accord with 
things as they are, and, hence, to secure realism in teaching, 
object-lessons, excursions, motor activity in construction work 
and manual training, etc., are used. Symbolism, on the com 
trary, means a form of behavior expressing an idea, a meaning, 
a mental process, or a conscious reality. 

To illustrate both things: — Longfellow had a conscious 
reality, a series of thoughts and emotions and volitions relating 
to a certain group of experiences; he expressed this reality by 
joining words together in the poem called The Rainy Day. 
These connected words are symbols of his mental reality. To 

* 184 



REALISM AND SYMBOLISM 185 

carry the illustration further : — A teacher might teach so that 
the pupils would get only the words of the poem and a few 
images or so that each pupil would get a mental series much like 
the mental series Longfellow originally had, or like the mental 
series in the teacher's mind. 

No teacher would consciously strive to give his pupils 
merely the symbols of a reality, but in many cases this is all the 
pupils actually get. This is due to the fact that while form is 
expressive of ideas, the control of form does not necessarily imply 
control of content. A large number of questions relating to 
schoolroom method find their answer in the answer to the broad 
question, What is the relation of thought to expression ? 

The mind of the newly born child is contentless — without 
thoughts, ideas, percepts, though it undoubtedly has the power 
to develop thoughts, percepts, etc. How does it develop these 
contents? Evidently its contact with the world has something 
to do with the process; and the world does simply this — it 
excites nerve-endings and tne excitation is conveyed inward to 
some centre of motor response. This motor response, or motor 
adjustment to a stimulus, antedates the conscious response. 
Moreover, this motor response in turn produces an excitation of 
nerve-endings in the muscles, and hence is a thing that leads 
to another motor adjustment. This process might continue 
indefinitely without any thought, and perhaps in some forms of 
life does so continue; but in the child there comes a time when 
there is what is called conscious response to distinguish it from 
reflex action, impulsive action, and instinctive action. 

But what shall be said regarding the possibility of conscious 
response in one in whom there is no reflex, impulsive, or instinc- 
tive action? From what is known of persons born partially 
anaesthetic, 1 the inference is that without the power of movement 
one could have no feeling, will, or knowledge. It seems that 
these preliminary movements are the bases for the development 
of mental life. James says, in substance, that a feeling or 

i Case cited in James' Briefer Course, p. 375 ff., and 417. 



186 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

volition stripped of its motor phases is a sheer nonentity. He 
even goes so far as to say that every percept, to remain such, 
requires a diffusion of nervous energy from the cerebral centres. 1 
It may be held, then, that no mental reality could be formed 
without motor attitude or be maintained as such without motor 
attitude. 

§ 44. THE FORMATIVE INFLUENCE OF MOTOR ATTITUDE. 

It is only a step farther to the view that this preliminary 
motor attitude, upon the basis of which mental reality comes 
to be, is symbolical in just the same sense that the motor attitude 
following it is symbolical. 

Mental contents arise in^con junction with a motor attitude 
and are then expressed by a similar motor attitude. The atti- 
tude of reverence produces a feeling of reverence. This feeling 
could not exist without the attitude preceding it any more than 
it can continue without an appropriate attitude. The first 
motor attitude prefigures a feeling yet-to-be, and the second 
motor attitude symbolizes a feeling that is; the first prefigures 
the feeling by determining it; the second symbolizes the feeling 
by expressing it. To illustrate: — A man makes a working 
drawing of a new machine. This drawing symbolizes, or 
stands for, the machine that is to be. After the machine 
has been made, the drawing symbolizes, or stands for, the 
machine as it is. 

The best treatment for sluggish, torpid, slow children is 
vigorous, rapid, accurate physical training. Mental alertness 
and quickness are developed by securing bodily alertness and 
quickness. The drill of a military school is good for a boy who, 
in his teens, does not seem to have any sense of conformity to 
social requirements, who has a tendency to throw off the forms 
of civilization and return to savagery. Very often the life of a 
military school will make a man of such a boy. Why ? Simply 
because of the influence of bodily tone and bodily attitude upon 

l Briefer Course, p. 376. 



REALISM AND SYMBOLISM 187 

mental tone and mental attitude. At these military schools 
it is sought to impart the physical tone and attitude, and to 
natural processes is left the result. The failures in such 
schools are due, in large part, to the force of already 
established physical and mental habits. Most boys will be- 
come civilized without this military discipline, because of their 
interest in doing as others do, and because of the formative 
influence of such action. 1 

All this simply means, when viewed from the genetic stand- 
point, that the physical attitude which is expressive of a mental 
attitude, if assumed and persisted in, will result in the formation 
of a parallel mental attitude. It means that "expressive atti- 
tude", or expression, is also a "formative attitude." In other 
words, motor attitude may form or reveal mental attitude. And, 
genetically considered, the formative phase of motor attitude 
precedes the revealing phase. Or, to state the conclusion 
differently: — (1) consciousness is motor in its origin; (2) con- 
sciousness exists, in early childhood, just to the extent that it is 
motor ; (3) all consciousness tends to become motor. 

§ 45. THE CHARACTER OF CONVENTIONALIZED SYMBOLS. 

It is necessary, however, to make a further distinction in 
order to be true to the facts of life. Some motor attitudes are 
conventional and, hence, imitativeiy acquired. C-a-t, as either 
a spoken or a written word, is motor attitude; but one can not 
get the meaning of it, the idea, by simply repeating or writing 
it during all the days of his life. To be sure, one would, from 
this motor activity, get some idea; but, in all probability, not 
the right idea. So, too, one could say plus, or make the sign 
( + ), without getting any adequate meaning of the symbol. 
To most readers of this book, the word otiose will be a good 
one to exercise upon in order to test the validity of the above 
positions. 

IJV. E. A. Proceedings, 1901. pp. 741-754, has a report on -'Subnormal 
Children.*' 



188 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

The reason for the truth of what has just been stated is 
that these motor attitudes are conventional symbols of mental 
realities. Plus means to add to, or and; it means that the terms 
between which it stands are to be united. No one can know 
what plus means except in terms of motor experience, but one 
who has this primary motor experience may associate with it a 
symbol, plus, -f , or (to invent one) thig, by a process of sheer 
association, i.e., by contiguity. 

The symbol thus associated with the thought or idea may 
be valid for the user alone, for him and for another, for him and 
the rest of the family or school, for all those who speak his 
language, or for all mankind. Primitive gesture is a symbolism 
which has validity for all mankind; shivering, for example, indi- 
cates that one is cold or frightened; falling relaxed upon the 
ground, that one is tired or faint. Water is a symbol having 
validity for all those who speak the English language; so, too, 
are all words which everybody knows and uses; but a large part 
■of one's vocabulary is valid only for him and a small portion of 
those who speak his language. Thosf-Tfu is a symbol which has 
validity for only a small group of students whose motto it was 
Forayear; a "school yell" has more of validity and meaning for 
the students who use it than it has for any of those who simply 
aear it given by them. 

A little girl, not four years old at the time, used to tell 
stories and illustrate them. Here is one of her stories and an 
attempted reproduction of her symbolism in expressing it: — 

Once there was a little birdie. 
Had a nest in a big tree. 
Nest had some blue eggs in it. 
Then it had little birdies in it. 
Once a birdie fell out of the nest. 
As she told this story she made the 
marks on the blackboard, but she 
had no idea of representing the char- 
acter of the objects by the marks she 



JG XT ^ 



REALISM AND SYMBOLISM 189 

was making. When asked to make a nest, she made this: — ^^ 
"Make a birdie." Again the same sort of diing: — IC^ 
"Make a tree/' And again the same sort of thing. — V^ 

A little girl, five years old, once told a story with toothpicks. 
She put them down on the table, telling as she did so what each 
one was to represent. They are labeled as she named them, 
but one can not show how she put them together in the latter 
part of the story. 



Birdie. 

Dog. 



Cat. 

Boy with stick. 

This was her story: — "Once a birdie was on the ground 
(this is the birdie). And there was a cat in the grass (this is 
the cat). And there was a dog with a bone (this is the dog). 
And a boy was walking along with a stick (this is the boy)." 

"The cat saw the birdie and wanted to eat it. The dog 
saw the cat and wanted to catch it. The boy saw the dog and 
wanted to whip it. The cat started for the birdie; the dog 
started for the cat; the boy started for the dog. The cat ran 
away from the dog, and the dog ran away from the boy. And 
so the boy found the birdie." 

These illustrations are introduced to show how the child 
expresses his meanings by arbitrary symbols. In the first story 
similar marks stand for very different things; in the second, 
toothpicks are symbols of four widely different things. The 
symbols have only a passing validity for the child, for the next 



190 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

time the bird story is told different marks may be used. By 
telling what this toothpick is, what the other one is, etc., the 
child is trying to make the symbols valid for both speaker and 
hearers for the present time. 

If the symbol is valid for all members of a social group for 
to-day and to-morrow and for next year, too, then it is called 
a conventionalized symbol. All conventionalized symbols are 
restricted, small, constrained motor activities which express 
realities only to the initiated. 

These conventionalized symbols give permanence and 
stability to mental life, because the symbol is so much of motor 
attitude, and, because motor attitude easily becomes habitual. 
Hence, thought realities may be readily recalled and connected 
in various ways just as soon as their conventionalized symbols 
have become habitual. Hence, also, the extremely rapid growth 
of the child in knowledge soon after he begins to use words as 
signs of his mental contents. It is generally believed by psychol- 
ogists that memory always implies the refunctioning of brain 
cells, and that there could be no memory (as human beings 
know it) without this brain activity. For this reason it is evi- 
dent that permanence and stability of mental life is primarily 
dependent upon motor attitudes without which there could be 
no organized brain connections. 

While in a broad way, motor attitudes form contents, or, 
at least, furnish the material which the mind elaborates into 
contents or realities for itself, it is not true that conventionalized 
symbols have this formative power. The conventionalized 
symbol is valuable: — (1) As it expresses an already existing or 
appreciated content; (2) as it, by expressing a content, renders 
the content clearer and more subject to one's command. 

The failure to appreciate these truths, or, appreciating them, 
the failure to be guided by them, is the fundamental pedagogical 
blunder of all ages. Form has usually preceded content in 
school instruction, because it was tacitly assumed that if the 
form were habitual the appropriate content would be called into 



REALISM AND SYMBOLISM 191 

existence. The folly of this never had a better illustration than 
in some of the schools of twenty years ago in which English 
Grammar was studied in the fourth grade by committing the 
definitions to memory. Since conventionalized symbols have 
validity only for the initiated, the effort, in elementary school 
work, should constantly be to develop thought or mental content 
in advance of its appropriate form; that is, realism is the first 
concern of the teacher. 

§ 46. THE INFLUENCE OF REALISM ON METHODS. 

Before discussing in detail the value of symbolism, or form, 
in education and its relation to the various school activities, it 
may be profitable to see how the ideal of realism has changed 
methods of teaching certain subjects in fehe elementary school. 

(a) Reading, the master key of all subjects, was formerly 
taught by beginning with the naming of the letters by sight; 
then a vowel and a consonant were joined making a syllable; 
these syllables were united into little sentences regarding the 
ox, the ax, ive, it, etc. ; then consonants were placed before these 
combinations, as box, tax, lax, bit. etc.; and again more sen- 
tences; and so on, by successive combinations, until the whole 
mechanism of words was mastered. This so-called ''Alphabet 
Method" begins with the simplest of the form, or symbolical, 
elements of written language, viz., the letters; it then proceeds to 
syllables and sentences, following the order of increasing com- 
plexity of form. 

After a while it was discovered that the child could learn 
to recognize by sight a series of words as readily as he could 
learn to recognize the letters of the alphabet. Hence, the "Word 
Method" of teaching beginning reading was introduced. In 
the word method there is possible a distinct advance because the 
child already uses oral words as symbols of his ideas and the 
written or printed symbol simply gives the child a new symbol 
for the content he already has. When the child has learned a 
few words in this way, he can name the words in the order 



192 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

arranged by the teacher and thus get a content, or thought, or 
series of images from his oral-word-series. This method is 
better than the alphabet method because the child sooner comes 
to realize that printed words are symbols of ideas. After a 
start has thus been made the child must get control, in some 
way or other, of the mechanics of reading. 1 

The "Phonic Method," of which there are many species, 
begins with an oral word which the pupils, following the exam- 
ple or suggestion of the teacher, analyze into its sounds. The 
w T ord is also written or printed before the pupils and the separate 
sounds are associated with the letters. Having thus acquired 
the vocal equivalents of several letters, the pupils proceed to 
make out new words by giving and synthesizing the appropriate 
sounds for the letter-sequence. The idea which the word symbol- 
izes comes into consciousness when this vocal synthesis is uttered, 
provided the child has already associated the idea with this par- 
ticular oral word. This method introduces the child to reading 
by giving him control of a mechanism by which he can translate 
the separate letters into sounds and thus build up oral words 
already significant to him. That is, this method recognizes 
that the child can not get contents from the symbolism of the 
printed page unless he has the power to translate these symbols 
into equivalent oral words already significant to him. 

The more recent methods of teaching beginning reading by 
basing it upon sentences derived from nature study, literature, 
and games are recognitions of the truth that words are symbols 
to the child only upon the condition that he associate ideas 
with them. Teachers have learned another thing, auz., the 
more vivid the idea in the child's mind and the more he is inter- 
ested in the idea sequence, the more readily will he come to 
associate the written or printed word with its appropriate idea. 
For these reasons the child will, for a time at least, make more 
rapid progress in learning to read by basing the material upon 

i It may be noted here that the mechanics of the process can he acquired 
only by sheer association. 



REALISM AND SYMBOLISM 193 

games in which he delights than by basing it upon such remark- 
ably dry and uninteresting sentences as: — I" have a slate. I have 
a pencil. I see a cat. Teachers are destined to learn another 
thing, viz., if they can succeed in awakening a desire to learn to 
read, proficiency in reading will be acquired in one-half the time 
now spent in acquiring it. Dull, listless, monotonous reading 
is largely the inevitable outcome of the usual plan of having the 
child read without a genuine motive. 

(b) Geography was, for a long time, taught from the form 
side, i.e., the child learned definitions of geographical concepts 
by committing them to memory rather than by building them 
up for himself on the basis of experience or on the basis of mem- 
ory and imagination. He studied maps and map questions 
without first having made maps of surface features and regions 
well known to him. He was supposed to learn of industries, com- 
merce, and government by learning the words of the textbook, 
or, at least, by learning the thought of the book. All this has 
happily changed. There is a symbolical phase of geography, 
and this symbolism can have validity only as the child by a pro- 
cess of sheer association regards it as symbolizing his already 
appreciated mental contents. Hence home geography and its 
symbolism are studied first; then by industrial and commercial 
connections, the study widens to adjacent regions, to regions 
more remote, to the earth as a whole. All of this change of 
method has come about through the belief that conventionalized 
forms have no power (genetically considered) to form contents. 

§ 47. THE VALUES OF CONVENTIONALIZED SYMBOLS TO 
TEACHING. 

Without examining the changes in method in other elemen- 
tary school subjects, the values of conventional symbolism, or 
form, to teaching will be considered. 

(a) The conventionalized symbol is an effective and rapid 
means of expressing one's ideas. It would be extremely diffi- 
cult to express one's thoughts by pantomime symbols because 



194 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

these are so complex and difficult to make. Because they are 
extremely complex they are liable to misinterpretation. Not 
so, however, with conventionalized symbols ; each has its definite 
idea back of it, and, being quickly made, expresses this idea 
effectively; and a series of such symbols expresses a series of 
ideas with great rapidity. If the reader will try to express a 
sentence in pantomime gesture, he will be convinced of the great 
value of conventionalized symbols for the effective and rapid 
expression of thought. 

(b) The conventionalized symbol also renders the expres- 
sion of one's ideas definite. The phrase last June makes the 
time relatively definite. Try now to express this to one who 
understands the time series but has no conventionalized symbols 
to express the parts of the series. If one expresses it as the time 
when flowers were in bloom, or as so many moons ago, or as the 
time when trout go up stream, it still lacks the definiteness 
which is characteristic of the words. Although one might ex- 
press that a friend went fishing with him, he could not express 
who he is any more definitely than by pointing out where he 
lives. 

(c) The most complete expression of one's thoughts is pos- 
sible when conventionalized symbols are supplemented by 
expressive gestures. In fact, symbols are made up chiefly of 
terms derived from motor attitudes and terms descriptive of 
motor attitudes. Words have a motor meaning which gesture 
brings out; and with this motor attitude comes the connotative 
feeling in a greater degree than by the use of the symbols alone. 
It is no mere accident that the speech centre is localized in the 
brain adjacent to the area which controls the movements of the 
more dextrous hand; nor is it an accident that speech begins to 
develop rapidly as soon as handedness becomes clearly marked 
in the child. 1 Expressive gesture is a great aid in supplying 
the connotation of words, and a great aid also in bringing out 
the precise meaning involved in the words used. 

1 Baldwin's Mental Development, Vol. I. pp. 67, 69. 71. 



REALISM AND SYMBOLISM 195 

(d) The teacher, however, has, as his primary object, the 
awakening of thoughts in the child. The test of thoughts is 
expression. The teacher, must therefore, see to it that the child 
has some adequate means of expression. The most adequate 
form of expression is that which most definitely, completely, 
rapidly, and effectively renders one's thought transparent to the 
other to whom he wishes to convey it. In organized society, 
ability to use conventionalized symbols or forms of expression is 
imperative, for effective expression is possible only through the 
use of forms that are valid for the whole group. The establish- 
ing of this expressive ability is, next to the awakening of thoughts 
in the child, the greatest concern of the teacher. 

(e) One reason for the last statement is found in the fact 
that the use of a conventionalized symbol has a reflex influence 
on the thought. By expression the thought becomes more 
definite. Many people find that the attempt to write out 
their thoughts renders the thoughts clearer. Hence, the repe- 
tition by the pupil of the story he has learned in literature or the 
multiplication table (provided it be not habitual already) renders 
his thoughts clearer and more definite. There is always an 
appreciated vagueness about a thought which one can not ex- 
press in conventionalized symbols. Hence, the use of these 
symbols has a distinct relation to the development of the child's 
power to think effectively. 

Having thus set forth some of the values of conventionalized 
symbolism to teaching, a consideration of the relation of con- 
ventional symbolism to the various school activities is demanded. 

Every genuine mental content has a form. It has been 
seen that motor attitude prefigures a content and also expresses 
this appreciated content. There is perhaps no idea, however 
insane it may be, that may not be expressed in some way or 
other. The activities of the insane are probably as truly 
expressive of their mental contents as are the activities 
of the sane. The insane person's thoughts are valid for 
himself alone, however, while the ultimate test for sanity 



196 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

is the validity of one's thought for both himself and his 
fellows. 

In the process of school education only those related ideas 
having this social validity are selected, and of them a course 
of study is made. If the teacher can succeed in influencing the 
child so that he thinks these socially valid ideas and then acts so 
as to express them adequately, he has succeeded in educating the 
child for social participation. If what has just been said is true, 
every study in the school must have a form phase and a content 
phase. And, moreover, this form phase is a conventionalized one. 

The necessity for this conventionalized form phase in school 
work may be clearly illustrated. Suppose that the teacher, with 
consummate patience and skill, presents "Grant's Campaign 
Against Vicksburg" to an eighth grade class, and that when 
Artie Smith is called upon to recite on this topic he begins to 
dance around the room. The teacher would feel at once that 
this was a case for the principal or the police. And he would 
feel so because Artie's response is different from the convention- 
alized form of expressing ideas relative to this topic. If a boy's 
only response is giggling, one can never tell what he knows 
about the Milky Way. Without the conventionalized symbols, 
or reaction, knowledge can not be adequately expressed. 

Hence, content and form are the two great concerns of the 
teacher. Genetically, content should and must precede con- 
ventionalized form. But when there is some degree of acquaint- 
ance with conventionalized forms the child can get contents 
through his reinterpretation of the forms placed before him. In 
fact, no elementary education which does not develop this 
ability to interpret conventionalized forms into equivalent con- 
tents is satisfactory. The thought of the race has in large meas- 
ure been transmitted to present society in conventionalized 
forms, and the child should master the combination. To this 
all agree; but there are dangers in the process. 

The danger is what is called verbalism — the use of symbols 
without the equivalent ideas in consciousness. Verbalism is 



REALISM AND SYMBOLISM 197 

l 

common just because it is so easy for children (and for adults, 
too, for that matter) to establish the motor habit required by 
conventionalized symbols. As already pointed out, conven- 
tionalized symbols are always small, restricted, constrained 
motor activities. Since it is so easy to establish these habits, 
the child finds it easier to master the symbol than to master the 
meaning. It is easy to "invert the terms of the divisor and pro- 
ceed as in multiplication," and difficult to understand why it 
is done. It is easy for a child to learn from a book that "New- 
port is noted as a summer resort," but difficult to form any 
adequate idea of what that really means. 1 What wonder if, 
when he has also learned to say, "Gloucester is a famous fish 
market" he should get them mixed and say, in response to a 
question regarding Newport, "Newport is noted as a fish mar- 
ket" ? When the child gets nothing but the symbolism from 
his study of a textbook in history, no wonder that he can not 
tell whether the First Continental Congress met before or after 
the battle of Bunker Hill. So persistent and insidious is this 
tendency to verbalism in schools of all grades that teachers 
must constantly guard against it. 

Dangerous and insidious though this tendency to verbalism 
be, elementary education must develop in the child the ability 
to interpret conventionalized symbols. In the development of 
this ability, the teacher must be forever demanding of the pupil 
some other expression of the meaning he has obtained from the 
symbols than that of the original symbols. Variety of expres- 
sion, constantly insisted upon, tends to develop self-reliance in 
the pupil and also the habit of reflecting upon the meaning of 
the symbols he encounters. 

§ 48. CONCLUSION ON THE FORMATIVE INFLUENCE OF MOTOR 

ACTIVITY. 

Summing up: — Every subject has a content phase and a 
conventionalized symbol phase. Genetically, the content should 
precede the symbol. However, the ability to translate symbol into 

l This illustration is based on reports by Supt. A. V. Greenraan, Aurora, 111. 



198 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

appropriate, equivalent content must be developed. The use of 
symbols is always in danger of becoming verbalism, a habit 
which means arrested intellectual development. 

If now the view be broadened to include forms of expression 
which are not conventionalized, it becomes evident that their 
use in schools has a distinct formative value. The upright, alert 
way of sitting, of standing, of walking, gives rise to a mental 
attitude of alertness, of balance, of control. The tone of a 
schoolroom is largely a social consciousness resulting from the 
habitual motor attitudes of the pupils. Physical cooperation 
begets the spirit of social cooperation. The effect of music in 
developing a school spirit is largely due to the fact that one sees 
and hears his fellows doing what he himself is doing, and thus 
each gets, through the similar physical expression, the similar 
feeling. No wonder that fads and fashions have their day angl 
their feelings with children as with adults. If one wants to get 
the "Indian Basket Craze" or the "Bead Work Fever" he 
should make a basket or set up a loom. 

The president of a normal school used to say: — "Young 
people, press yourselves against the molding influences of your 
environment/' His thought was that the students could get 
what the school had to offer only by actively adjusting them- 
selves to its various requirements and opportunities. Over 
and over again it is proved that those who actively participate 
in anything — be it a game, a song, a dance, a church sociable, 
a missionary society, or a process of industry — get more from 
it than do those who simply look on. 

If the teacher regards, as the end of all his efforts with the 
child, an actual, helpful, kindly, effective, generous, adequate 
social participation in the life of the race, he will surely find that 
the intellectual, emotional, and volitional phases of participation 
are possible only as they are matrixed in, or arise from, motor 
activity. Hence, in all elementary school education large use 
should be made of motor activity in its various forms, not only 
as an expressive thing, but also as a formative thing. 



REALISM AND SYMBOLISM 199 

Tt should also be evident that the motor activity which has 
become a habit is no longer educative. One carves a certain 
design for the panels of a table and through the carving he is 
influenced, formed, trained, changed; the world of carved things 
thereafter has a new and deeper interest for him. But suppose 
he continues carving panels just like this one, day in and day 
out, year in and year out, what will be the effect? A closed 
series will be formed, no new associations will be set up, and he 
will cease to learn from his activity. Any trade or occupation 
is educative as it is being learned, but as soon as it becomes 
habitual, mechanical, automatic, its educative aspect disappears. 
Those trades which constantly involve new relations, new ad- 
justments, and change are the ones which are the most educa- 
tive. From the explanation just given it can be seen why the in- 
creasing division of labor which shreds occupation to a small, 
mechanical routine is really dangerous not only to the develop- 
ment but also to the survival of genuine intelligence. And it 
should also be clear that simple, unthinking repetition of the 
symbolism of knowledge by pupils fails to be educative. One 
ought to say, perhaps, that all mechanical, unthinking repeti- 
tion, either physical or mental, is formative — the inevitable pro- 
duct being stupidity. 

When one stops to reflect upon the course of elementary 
education, as it is shaping itself in response to social pressure, he 
sees how largely the formative influence of motor activity is being 
recognized. Drawing, painting, modeling, and construction 
work are not merely so many means of expression — they have a 
formative influence far greater than their expressive function. 
Teachers have given up the plan of developing the right attitude 
toward industry and labor by means of textbook study, and in 
its place have put manual training and domestic economy as 
affording things to be clone by pupils. So, too, in rural schools 
teachers are beginning to find that interest in agriculture and 
farm life can come only from instruction which is based upon 
doing. The formative influence of physical exercises and games 



200 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

Is being recognized in a practical way in many schools. And 
as regards the conduct of pupils, teachers arc coming to recog- 
nize that the great thing is the influence of conduct upon civic 
attitude. In short, the aphorism, "We learn to do by doing," 
may be stated thus: — "We learn to think, to feel, and to will by 
and through our doing." 

In a broad way, the ideas gained through motor activity are 
the basal ones in life. The silk worm transforms mulberry 
leaves into silk threads; the poppy transforms heat, moisture, 
and loam into delicately colored, gauze-like petals; the mind 
transforms primary motor images into literature, art, science, and 
philosophy. In this process of transformation, conventionalized 
symbols should always be subordinated to those deeper, broader 
forms of experience which are idea-giving, or formative. 



CHAPTER XI. 

Stages of Knowledge and Stages of Instruction. 

The child changes, grows, develops, and each particular 
change" influences his inner self. In this process of growth 
there are certain clearly marked stages which the teacher should 
understand in order that he may the more effectively adapt the 
materials of education to the changing self of the child. 

There are no observable gaps between the child's first 
crude knowledge and his most highly refined knowledge as a 
mature person; there is only a more conscious predominance of 
certain elements or phases of consciousness at one time than at 
another. To know a "flower in the crannied wall" is to know 
all things; to know any one thing implicitly involves all that is 
explicit in knowing any or all other things. The so-called 
"higher mental processes" are implicit in the lower ones. And 
these implicit phases may become explicit to a greater or less 
extent. The so-called "stages of knowledge" are merely names 
for stages in which certain intellectual phases of consciousness 
are strongly explicit, as, for example, the imaginative stage, the 
sense contact stage, the memory stage, the concept forming 
stage, etc. One may conceive of stages of feeling and stages of 
will as well as stages of knowledge. In a previous chapter 
the chief stages in the sense of selfhood in developing children 
were outlined. The present chapter will analyze the stages of 
knowledge and inquire into the demands made upon instruction 
by the characteristics of these several intellectual stages. 

§ 49. ANALYSIS OF KNOWLEDGE INTO IMAGE AND CONCEPT 
STAGES. 

In order that one may get at a glance the outline of the 
chapter, the following classification is introduced: — 

201 



202 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

I. Image Stage: — 

A. Wonder and name-getting:. 

B. Make-believe and fancy. 

C. Dramatization, games, and imitation of social activi- 
ties. 

D. Invention, individual achievement, distinction, and 
discovery. 

E. Causal series from sense contact. 

II. Concept Stage: — 

A. Concept forming, classification, and definition. 

B. Judgment forming and opinion making. 

C. Causal thinking and the formation of personal atti- 
tudes. 

D. Logical thinking and systematization. 

There are but two stages of thinking, and consequently 
but two stages of knowledge, viz., (a) the image stage, in which 
the response of the mind to a physical stimulus is the characteris- 
tic feature, and (b) the concept stage, in which the characteristic 
is that the terms of the thinking have been derived by the mind 
itself from reflection upon its sensory-derived experiences. That 
activity of consciousness which follows upon the stimulation of a 
nerve-ending or of a set of nerve-endings is called an immediate 
image, or percept. That activity of consciousness, on the con- 
trary, which follows upon the activity of a brain cell or set of 
brain cells and which is not produced by the stimulation of a 
nerve-ending is called a mediated image. Of these mediated 
images there are two kinds; memory images which are regarded 
by the mind as equivalents of former images, and constructive 
images (called imagination for lack of a better term) which are 
really new combinations and groupings of former images or 
parts of images. By means of these mediated constructive 
images, one's actual experience is broadened to include (ideally 
at least) the possibilities of his actual experience. The image, 
consequently, is sometimes defined as "a symbol of an actual 
or possible experience." But it must not be forgotten that, 
genetically considered, images arise out of contact with objects. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 203 

The concept, however, is, from, this standpoint, "a sign, or 
symbol, of the essential characteristics, elements, or relations of 
a group of actual or possible experiences." And this sign of a 
group of experiences comes into being for consciousness by the 
mind's reflective activity. Images are at first connected in a 
spatial or temporal sequence by which one's mental activities 
are limited (even when memory is active) to things as they have 
actually occurred in his experience. It is through thinking by 
similarity and causal connection that this experience becomes, 
recombined into groups or unities which are concepts. 

It is not maintained, however, that there is a sharp, absolute 
line of demarcation between images and concepts. All that is 
urged is that the mind regards some of its activities as referring 
to particular things in the objective world, while other of its 
activities are regarded by it as referring to meanings or unities 
which it itself has made. At times, nevertheless, the mind re- 
gards its own concepts as signs of an objective order; as, for 
example, some men regard the law of gravitation as an actually 
existing objective reality. This is due to the eccentricity of 
thought — the tendency of the mind to regard all its own activi- 
ties as objective realities; and this is due, it would seem, to the 
fact, that all consciousness is motor in its origin and tendency. 
A little consideration, however, will convince anyone that all 
scientific and mathematical laws are simply thought-constructs 
derived from reflection upon experience. 

It is not maintained that the thinking of any one person is 
ever wholly of the image or of the concept type. The two types 
of thinking overlap and interweave in a wonderfully complex 
way. Some minds seem to think almost exclusively in images ; 
the great movements and stages of history are summed up in 
pictures of men and of places; the law of gravitation is imaged 
as a falling apple; the expansive power of steam is thought of as 
a lifted teakettle lid, etc. Other minds, however, seem to 
abstract essentials and think them in terms which can not be 
expressed in sensory terms at all. The essential thing to get at 



204 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

is that the way in which the mind regards its activity (whether 
as relating to a particular experience or to the essentials of a 
group of similar experiences) is the only distinction between 
images and concepts. 

Within each of these stages of knowledge, however, there 
may be distinguished sub-stages with well-defined character- 
istics, but which do not follow a set time order in their develop- 
ment. In the following pages the treatment will depart to a 
considerable extent from the traditional forms of analysis, be- 
cause of a strong conviction that the sub-stages as outlined in 
the following pages are closely in accord with the reality of the 
child's expanding mental life, and, also, because such an analysis 
as is here presented will, all things considered, be more helpful 
to teachers than is the traditional analysis of adult consciousness 
found in the books on psychology. 

§ 50. SUB-STAGES OF IMAGE THINKING. 

A. Wonder and name-getting. 

Intellectual life begins in wonder. Wonder means that the 
object presented is not immediately associated in a significant 
way by the mind, and that there is an effort so to associate it- 
Its opposite is described by the adjective blase — everything is 
immediately given its place in the organized mental series, and 
is regarded as the "same old story." There is nothing new for 
such a person; he is dulled and stupefied as is an overfed ox. 
Life, to the blase person, is like a squeezed orange — dry, juice- 
less, shrunken. And out of such an attitude no intellectual 
growth can proceed. Growth in knowledge demands wonder. 
The best definition of genius is, "the ability to wonder at the 
commonplace." 

This attitude of wonder leads the child to ask questions of 
those about him, to experiment with things, to taste, handle, 
and smell things. The child's questions are: — "What is that 
called?" (in the hope that perhaps through its name he can 
identify it). "What does it do?" (perchance he can connect 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 205 

with it by means of its function). "What's that part for?" (try- 
ing to see the relation of the part-function to the whole-function). 
And so on he goes, expressing his attitude of wonder by ques- 
tions, and having it, in a measure, satisfied by getting names or 
words or actions which enable him to associate a new thing with 
other things and thus understand or know it. Fortunate in- 
deed is the person in whom the attitude of wonder neither dims 
nor dies. 

B. Make-believe and fancy. 

Through the process just mentioned, however long it may 
continue, the child gets knowledge, and words and aetions tc 
express this knowledge. And with this equipment he begins 
his constructive career of learning through doing. He "makes 
believe" ; that is, he acts as if he were a cat, a flower, a mouse, or 
a goblin ; he acts as if a cat were an elephant, a tiny doll, a real 
baby, a crust of bread, a piece of cake, etc. This is fancy — 
regarding. as real that which is unreal. In its first manifesta- 
tions in the child, this fancy seems to be spontaneous — not a 
planned thing, but a natural phase of development. It grows 
by what it feed's on, and becomes significant in the formation of 
character as it is guided and directed by social criticism and 
suggestion. 

Not all make-believes are worth while, even though all 
may be interesting and pleasurable to the child. The make- 
believe of the fairy story is worth- while because it is essentially 
moral (in general) in its influence; it is true to life in all vital 
relations. So, too, make-believes with dolls, and the mani- 
fold plays of children founded upon human occupations and 
relationships are valuable in giving the child an appreciation oi 
these life realities in terms which he can comprehend. 

The extension of this field of fancy and make-believe is 
clearly recognized in the work of the novelist, the artist, the 
sculptor, and the composer. Of course there is something be- 
sides fancy and make-believe in these adult achievements; but 



206 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

without this primary element these things would be impossible 
to adults. 

There is, perhaps, no period in elementary school education 
during which the child's fancy does not need stimulation or, at 
least, food. Along the lines already indicated it should be culti- 
vated, not entirely by or through any particular subject, but by 
and through and in every subject. 

C. Dramatization, games, and imitation of social activities. 

The preceding stage implies another very closely related to it 
--—the stage of dramatization, games, and imitation of social 
activities. This stage differs from the second stage chiefly in 
the fact that while the second is largely spontaneous, the third 
is consciously performed. The child consciously (choosing 
means to a clearly conceived end) sets himself about achieving 
an end. The presence of choice, deliberation, end, motive, 
suitability of the means to the end, etc., makes this stage essential 
to any true development. The initiative must become internal 
before character is self-formed. So long as the child auto- 
matically responds to an objective stimulus, he is formed there- 
by, but not self-formed. He is the sport of circumstances, not 
the architect of his own fate. 

The material, or copy, for this stage of development is 
found in the child's social environment, or chiefly so. The child 
may, of course, dramatize of his own accord the activities of a 
bird, but most frequently such dramatization is directly sug- 
gested by some older person or playmate, or indirectly suggested 
by the doing of the thing in question. In games complex in 
character it is clear that both the suggestion to play them and 
the details in the process are socially derived. It is equally clear 
that, however much of natural tendency or instinct to dramatize 
and to play there may be in the child, the content of his games 
and dramatization is determined by the character and suggestive 
force of his social environment. 

In both dramatization and games the child is endeavoring 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 207 

to reproduce through appropriate action the idea or image he 
has in mind; that is, dramatization and games are, essentially, 
conscious imitative processes. The "copy" is essentially of the 
image rather than of the conceptual type. But to make this copy 
real in action requires, as has already been stated, the conscious 
selection and utilization of former elements of experience in new 
relations. For this reason, then, conscious imitation is neces- 
sary to the development of independence and of the sense of 
power. 

Conscious imitation usually finds ample copy in the social 
occupations surrounding the child. He reproduces this copy 
bit by bit, and thus builds up within himself an appreciation of 
the texture of that system of relationships and activities which 
we call society. "Ye must be doers of the deed before ye can 
understand the doctrine." It is not enough to understand the 
processes ; for the feeling value (and hence complete and adequate 
knowledge) comes only with motor realization. 

It is not necessary, however, that one do all things in this 
way; the principle of "serviceably associated habit" is operative 
and its operation is vicarious. One may have never worked 
out a fine on the "rock pile," and yet know how it is. If he has 
used an ax and a sledge, worked in the broiling heat of the sun, 
done things which he was forced to do, and had feelings of resent- 
ment against those in authority, he can realize what is meant by 
working out a fine on a rock pile — not fully, but fully enough 
for a law-abiding citizen. 

One can understand the complex social life about him in 
no other way. One becomes humanized only through human 
activity. Hence, when this conscious imitative stage appears 
in children it demands nurture, it demands copy. Some parents 
will not allow their children to have hammers for fear they may 
mash their fingers; others forbid the making of mud pies. Some 
parents seem to think that their children can learn simply by 
reading. Some secondary school teachers seem to think that 
their pupils can learn -about industries, from books, and; to the 



208 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

extent already indicated, this is true. But there must be 
a stock of primary experiences in terms of which these symbols 
arc interpreted. All construction work, all manual training, 
domestic science, observation, and experimentation are founded 
upon this idea, and they yield experiences whose elements may 
become synthesized into ideals of life and attitudes toward it. 
But, even granting the validity of the principles thus far 
advanced, certain questions regarding the proper field for the 
exercise of the child's conscious imitative processes still remain. 
These Questions are: — 

1. What things should be dramatized? 

2. What games should be played? 

3. What social activities should be reproduced? 
The pages immediately following will indicate answers to these 
questions. 

1. Dramatization — In dramatization the idea of the way 
in which a person (or thing thought of as a person) acts, behaves, 
or performs his part in a social relationship (or in a series of such 
relationships) is acted out. Usually this idea of a character is 
an inference from certain data already in the child's possession. 
The child thinks of himself as being the character or personality 
which is to be dramatized, and acts in accordance with this pre- 
vailing thought of personality. In the best dramatization all 
thought of self is lost, and with utter abandon the person be- 
comes the character he impersonates. 

In general, the most educative material for dramatization 
in schools is found in literature. Seldom are the characters 
isolated, but instead, have their destinies linked together. Hence, 
the dramatization of literature has a social reference. This 
dramatization, however, should be by the children and not by 
the teacher. Some of the fairy tales may be used, as Cinderella, 
The Three Bears, The Four Miu$icians, etc. ; portions of Robin- 
son Crusoe, of Hiawatha, of Indian stories, myths, and many 
songs; dialogues descriptive of the working out of human mo- 
tives; even standard dramas may be acted out with memorized 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 



20V) 



parts, or with a reading of the parts. The drama, however, 
prescribes the separate steps in the dramatization and hence is 
not so truly and highly educative (though more perfect) as is 
that in which the child's own initiative determines the steps and 
selects the materials. Children may also with profit dramatize 
stories which they themselves have written. 

.2. Games — In a game there is an end to be achieved in 
accordance with certain regulating rules, and there is usually 
some person or thing whose function it is to oppose the achieve- 
ment of this particular end by being "the stubbornly silent 
partner," or else by setting up another end the achievement of 
which is inconsistent with the first end. Hence, there arises the 
desire to win, to be more skillful, stronger, or acute than the 
opponent. 

In many games, however, the achievement of an end by a 
group of individuals is the dominant note, and no opponent 
directly appears. In all such games the one thing that dis- 
organizes them and prevents their realization is the ignorance of 
some one of the players; and hence, the real opponent is the com- 
plexity of the required coordination of movement, or, stated 
differently, the possibility of individual or group error. This 
fact of opposition is essential to the enlistment of interest, and 
is also that which makes development and growth possible 
through games. 

If the ideas already set forth regarding the process by and 
through which the child becomes socialized be correct, the edu- 
cative worth of games can be easily formulated. Games are 
truly educative to the extent that they equip the child with ele- 
ments of behavior socially serviceable to him, or with standards 
of judgment, or with habits .of ready and accurate judgment 
which serve him as types in different social situations. For illus- 
tration:— The politeness towards equals in many games becomes 
immediately serviceable to the .child; the violation of a rule of 
the game has its penalty attached, and this, together with other 
features of games, leads to the standard, "Play Fair" ; tiie chang- 



210 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

ing situations must be seized upon instantly and a plan of action 
determined upon. 

Nearly all games are learned by conscious imitation but, as 
elsewhere in human activity, progress is possible only through 
invention. Many children invent games for themselves, or 
change and modify them to suit conditions. On the contrary, 
some children not only always imitate, but are not able to do 
even this well, and consequently, stand aside as mere on-lookers. 
Those who imitate well become amateurs, enthusiasts, "cranks," 
"rooters," or even reliable players; those who can not imitate 
successfully may attend games because it is the style to do so, 
but they regard them as stupid or senseless; those who can im- 
provise — invent expedients within the rules — become the "stars," 
the "professionals." From this standpoint, an acquaintance 
with games is desirable as a basis for appreciating the games 
played by others, and thus gaining the power to understand them. 

Two things should now be evident: — The playground 
is an important educative agency; and the. supervision of pupils' 
games is an essential function of the school, or teacher. Teach- 
ers are not responsible for all the influences that play upon their 
pupils, for there are extra-schoolroom influences of the street, 
home, and associates over which the teacher has no control; but 
a good teacher will exert such an influence over his pupils that 
it follows them during their waking hours and even affects their 
dreams. It is, therefore, a duty of the teacher to influence the 
pupil's ideals of play. • 

Not everything can be taught through games, nor should 
there be schoolroom games in all grades. In the lower grades 
many things may be learned through games, and in all grades 
the games at recesses and intermissions should be directed and 
supervised so that good, not harm, may result. Wrong social 
attitudes, such as sneaking, cheating, or even bullying may 
develop in some children if their games are not rightly directed. 
The desire to win becomes so strong that it justifies the means- 
rivalry and jealousy supplant cooperation and sympathy. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 211 

The element of physical exercise in games deserves a word 
of comment. Physical exercise with a real, interesting end in 
view is accompanied by feelings of exhilaration and of interest. 
It is, therefore, more serviceable, because it associates pleasur- 
able feelings with bodily activity, than is a series of gymnastic 
exercises however carefully the latter may be planned, for the 
end (physical exercise or health) is usually so remote that it has 
little emotional intensity. 

3. Imitation of social activities — In this topic the conscious 
imitation of industrial and commercial processes, conventional 
forms of social behavior (etiquette and behavior), and political 
processes are to be considered. 

(a) Political processes — The reproduction of those forms 
of social activity which we call political will, of course, come only 
in the higher grades of the elementary school and in secondary 
schools. It is, however, an important element in education for 
citizenship, for the development of political attitudes can not 
wholly be trusted either to chance influences or to the study of 
constitutions and descriptions of political functions. Political 
action is only one phase of the very complex reality called society. 
As such it is an outgrowth of human needs and is a means to 
social ends. If this is true of political action in its relation to 
social action, the child should come to feel the need of govern- 
ment, of authority, as a means for the realization of the social 
needs of himself and others. He is not born with this clear 
vision, or insight; but, on the contrary, he often manifests a dis- 
position to use everything, including his parents and his fellows, 
as means to his own private and personal ends. Physical force 
may, at times, be necessary to impress upon the child the funda- 
mental truth that the ends set up by others have a validity 
greater than his own. Usually, however, the frequent recurrence 
of this necessity indicates a social fault other than that of the 
child. 

The pupil should feel that the school is a place where he 
and others (including the teacher) are working together for cer- 



212 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

tain common ends. This fooling is the fooling of "a community 
of interests," of what the sociologists call "social solidarity." 
For the successful accomplishing of these common ends, a series 
of eonstant ways of reacting and behaving is necessary. Uncon- 
sciously, at first, the child falls into these ways of behavior; and, 
gradually, as maturity warrants and achievement furnishes the 
basis, eonformity gives way to cooperation — mere habit gives 
place to action from motive. It is just at this point that con- 
scious imitation enters, the action consonant with the motive 
being selected in the process. In general, the child will choose 
actions that are efficient for the realization of the ends he sets up, 
provided only that these actions are present in his consciousness 
as copy. 

Political action has two stages — the ballot box stage and 
the quiet, unobtrusive, daily stage. One's political duty may 
reach its climax at the polls; but the long preparation for this 
climax, and the long aftermath (during which the w T ill of the 
sovereign people becomes a political reality or else an evidence 
of human weakness), have a duty no less insistent, no less vital 
than that of election day. This daily political duty is more of 
an attitude of mind than a habit. If so, the essential elements 
of this duty can become a part of the woof and warp of the 
child's mental life only by a daily attitude toward things. The 
daily attitude of the child toward the school is the most essential 
thing in determining his daily civic attitude. Of course, the 
extra-schoolroom influences may be stronger than those of the 
school, but schools should be so efficient that their influence out- 
weighs all other influences in this respect. 

It would seem, moreover, that this attitude of mind toward 
daily civic duty can come only through the physical attitude. 
This means, for the teacher, that the various activities of the 
school should be of such a character that the child, through par- 
ticipation, gets essentially the same feeling attitude toward the 
school that he ought to have in later life toward the totality of 
political life — the state. This feeling is not mere loyalty — it is 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 213 

loyalty because of the opportunity for self-realization through 
service afforded by the object, be it school or state. 

All this simply means that pupils should actively participate- 
in the governmental phase of school activity. The pupil should 
feel that every rule of the school is for his benefit. And he should 
feel so (not by faith, not because he is told so by his teacher, 
but) because of his having seen the relation between his own 
ends and the activities of the school. In primary grades this 
feeling is and must be (because of the immaturity of the child 
both socially and mentally) largely a matter of faith; but faith 
should "approach zero as its limit" as the child reaches the 
higher grades ; for, after all, mere obedience to external authority, 
with no matter how great degree of love and faith, is no adequate 
basis for participation in the political life of a democracy. The 
motive to action must become internal. 

This brings to the front another question, viz., Can this civic 
attitude be brought about without the trappings, or concrete 
accompaniments, of actual government? Occasional elections 
according to the Australian Ballot System are not enough; but 
must the school then be organized as is a city or state? The 
Henry George School for Boys is a city or state in which the 
boys are citizens, and its success in dealing with boys whose 
early lives have been spent on the streets of New York is truly 
wonderful. So, too, the School for Orphan Boys on Thomp- 
son's Island, Boston Harbor, is founded upon this idea. The 
Hyde Park (Chicago, 111.) High School is also a self-governing 
unit with all the trappings. Nearly all the grades of the John 
Crerar School, a ward school of Chicago, under the principal- 
ship of John T. Ray, are controlled by a pupil system of govern- 
ment. And many other schools are so organized. 

The question should be narrowed a little. Granting that 
participation is necessary, the question still remains, Is partici- 
pation possible without some form of cooperation? No, but 
that form of cooperation need not necessarily have any simili- 
tude to a national form of government, It may not be feasible 



214 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

to have such a form, but the reality must be there. Pupils can 
learn to cooperate only by and through cooperation. Coopera- 
tion without a form is an abstraction. Therefore, there must be 
some form of activity by and through which cooperation be- 
comes a reality for each child. To the individual teacher must 
be left the problem of what form is best for him to use. 1 

(b) Conventional forms of social behavior — It will be con- 
ceded without argument that there should be training in eti- 
quette, politeness, manners; but the extent of such training, and 
the content of such training are not so easily marked out. So 
much depends on the home life of the p ipil and the status of 
-the community. To outline a "course of study" in these things 
would be impossible, but their influence on the development 
of the child and the process by which he acquires them may be 
outlined. 

The Lange-James theory of emotion states that emotion 
genetically depends upon and follows upon physical activity. 2 
The "return wave of expression," which gives rise to "sensations 
of having acted" is the basis from which feeling, or emotion, 
develops. Therefore, physical activity must precede the develop- 
ment of feeling. The physical activity of politeness is, there- 
fore, the necessary antecedent of the mental attitude of polite- 
ness. This is true of all manners. Hence, training in these 
things is the only way to develop and organize this portion of 
the child's feelings. Manners not only reveal the man; in a 
genetic sense they form him. Just as a conventional symbol, 
such as gentian, expresses a thought reality, so, too, a conven- 
tional action expresses separate feelings toward others. And 
these feelings become socially communicable by virtue of their 
conventional character. 3 

The effect of manners upon one s development and their 
values for him may be best appreciated by considering what he 

iln Jean Mitchell's School the idea of the government of a school is 
worked out in a helpful manner. 

2 James' Briefer Course, pp. 375-390. 

3 Conventional means valid for both, understood by both. Teachers 
should become familiar with Emerson's Essay on Manners: 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 215 

would be without them. This at once makes the matter so clear 
thai it needs only to be summed up by saying that manners areas 
valuable to individual development and success as is knowledge. 

It should be clear, also, that the primary stock of manners 
is acquired by imitation of elders or superiors. This makes the 
imparting of a primary equipment of these forms of behavior 
easy and also a matter of great delicacy. The child sees his 
elders doing a certain thing, acting in a certain way; and he does 
the same, thereby getting primarily the same feelings. The 
child's feelings, however, are not the same as the adult's for the 
adult has many associations the child knows nothing of. To 
illustrate: — In a family containing several children, a baby two 
weeks old died. One of the children, a girl aged nine, knew the 
fact but did not know how to behave. Soon, however, she saw 
adult relatives crying, and began to cry. From this crying she 
obtained a feeling of sadness. She watched the others and kept 
on crying most of the time for a day and a half. Then while at 

a neighbor's she naively asked: — "Mrs. , how long am I 

supposed to cry because my baby brother died?" The adults 
had life experiences associated with the fact of death about 
which this little girl knew nothing, and yet she was imitating 
their action. When another death touching this girl's life shall 
occur, the weeping and lamentation of this, her first experience, 
will serve her as copy. 

The same thing is seen in children in the presence of strang- 
ers. Fond mothers offer suggestions, as, " Johnnie, shake hands 
with the lady!" "Say, 'Thank you !' to the gentleman." In 
all such cases the verbal instruction is so much copy for the child 
to realize through action. Invention is possible to the child as 
to the race and is possible under the same conditions, viz., a stock 
of knowledge already existing and capable of new combinations. 
Manners, however, change slowly, and there is often a return to 
simpler forms, especially under stress of excitement. So, too, 
manners are slowly built up in a growing child, for he forms per- 
manent habits slowly. Conscious imitation must be often per- 



216 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

formed to result in habitual action or even in a strong tendency 
to habitual action. 

While it is thus easy to give the child a primary equipment 
in manners, it is dangerous for two reasons: 

First. The child may get nothing but the conventional 
aspect of the behavior. Genetically, the feelings from lifting 
one's hat to a lady are arm and chest sensations. If one stops 
with merely this formal activity, his manners may have polish 
and technique but they will lack in genuineness and appropriate- 
ness. The genuineness comes from associated feelings of re- 
spect, of deference, of loyalty. It is quite possible for one to 
have the form without the content; quite inevitably so at first 
unless children are allowed to be barbarians until they are well 
along in their teens; and there is danger that, even though one 
insists on the form and tries to instill the content, the form will 
be the only thing the child retains. 

Second. The child may deceive others by his manners. He 
may behave properly enough and have improper feelings which 
are only intensified by being thus dammed up within him. Man- 
ners may thus be a successful method of deceiving others; and 
if this grows into a habit, its influence is bad. 

(c) Conscious imitation of industrial and commercial proc- 
esses — In the child's games he imitates in a loose and highly 
imaginative way many of the industrial and commercial activ- 
ities of social life. Children play church, school, store, etc., and 
get therefrom a sense of what life is. But along certain lines of 
industrial and commercial activity this sense of what life is should 
become more definite by approaching more closely the reality. 
This can be brought about only by conscious imitation. It is 
usually left to the child's chance experiences outside of school. 
The school can not escape its social responsibilities by pleading 
lack of time or by saying that parents do not do their duty by 
their children. It is the business of the school, provided it be 
not done in the homes, to impart that which the expanding life 
of the child needs for its genuine socialization. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 217 

Iii the following outline of things which it is believed the 
child should thus imitate, it should be understood that within 
certain limits there is possible a substitution of equivalents for 
the things here outlined. The effort, moreover, is to outline 
only those things which the race has found it necessary to do for 
its own benefit and advantage in its struggle for survival and 
progress. It is believed that these things are fundamental in 
every civilization, and hence, a motor acquaintance with and 
understanding of them is essential to the civilization of a person. 

(r) Tilling the soil is an ancient and honorable work. It 
is so fundamental to-day that it is said, " Agriculture is the pri- 
mary source of all wealth." At least, contact with nature is the 
primary source of all the world's wealth. Early in the race's 
struggle, men began to till the soil, because settled homes were 
impossible without a food supply. People can not live wholly 
on a meat diet, and, in temperate climes, must raise cereals and 
vegetables during the summer. The child will grow r to feel as 
does society only by performing the actions in question. There- 
fore, to plant seeds and care for them is a socializing process. 
And this planting, this mimic agriculture, should include the 
raising of flowers and of vegetables. The purpose of this train- 
ing is not commercial, although the economic utilization of the 
products is an essential part of the lesson to be learned. 

The social structure of to-day renders it impossible that 
children living in cities should have this training under the direc- 
tion of their parents. Oftentimes the few flowers in the school- 
room are the only things along this line to enter the child's life. 
The school garden is an effort to provide a substitute for the 
larger training each child should have. It is not clear at just 
what point or points in the child's life this agriculture activity 
should come. There seems a very strong desire, at some time 
in each child's life, to care for plants; but the appearance of this 
desire seems to depend upon the suggestiveness of the social 
environment. If, therefore, this agriculture activity is to be 
directed but for a short period of the child's school life, it should 



218 ELEMENTARY EDUCAITON 

be when he has strength enough and motor control enough to 
get the most out of it, probably between the ages of ten and four- 
teen. If, however, the school attempts a school garden at all, 
the training should extend over more years and begin earlier in 
the child's life. 

(s) Along with, preceding, or closely following (let the 
anthropologists decide) the beginning of this agriculture activity 
in the life of the race was the effort to exterminate injurious 
forms of animal life and to domesticate other forms. The desire 
to do these same things reappears in the lives of children in 
degrees of intensity which vary with the social environment. 
This world-wide effort is also world-long, for it is not at all likely 
that invention can ever fully destroy all pests or supplant the 
domestic animals. Then, too, there are certain ethical relations 
arising from the use of animals by men. These ethical relations 
can be brought out by the keeping of animals as pets. If a 
child treats his pet (be it dog, cat, goat, rabbit, mouse, pigeon, 
or wolf) as he should, he gets from this activity the essentials of 
what his conduct should be toward all animals. Toys, even 
those that move and make noises, can not fully teach this lesson. 1 

This whole matter of attitude toward different animals is 
learned by conscious imitation. Some animals may be studied 
in the schoolroom, but few, if any pets should be kept'at school. 
The homes should furnish the materials for this element in 
development; but teachers should encourage the keeping of pets 
and the painstaking care of them. A school menagerie is not 
an impossibility but it should be at a distance from the school. 

(t) Another fundamental activity in the life of the race, both 
past and present, is weaving. Children can readily learn to 
weave on looms made in the schoolroom. Through this motor 
activity they can come to appreciate the significance of weaving 
in the life of the race. There is also abundant opportunity for 
invention in making designs and various articles. As mere busy 

1 Hodge, Nature Study and Life, pp. 33-44, has a good comment on the 
keeping of pets : and Hyde's Practical Ethics, pp. 98-103, treats the relation of 
men to animals. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 219 

work weaving is not worth while, but as a means of fostering 
inventiveness, of developing respect for industry, of setting up 
ends which the child can really achieve, it commends itself 
strongly to all teachers, and especially to those in lower grades. 1 

(u) Then again, there are many simple domestic activities, 
absolutely necessary to the conduct of the home, with which 
children should become acquainted. Visual acquaintance is 
not enough; the acquaintance should be muscular. Moreover, 
skill should result. Pleasure comes with skillful success in this 
as in other things. 

The extent to which these domestic activities become proper 
material for school instruction depends upon local social condi- 
tions and ideals. These conditions and ideals are variables, and 
hence, it cannot be maintained that all schools should teach these 
simple domestic activities. All that is here urged is that motor 
skill in these simple domestic activities is an essential element in 
the development of the child — essential to a symmetrical human 
development. The home, upon which people rely so exclusively 
for the perpetuity of civilization, cannot maintain its purity and 
influence if all become "boarders." 

(v) Then, too, shelter is as necessary as is food and cloth- 
ing. The building of playhouses and blockhouses is more than 
simple amusement for the child. There are certain funda- 
mental forms of this building activity which should be fostered. 
Boxes are so universally useful that every person should be able 
to make one. So, too, chairs, tables, shelves, etc. The making 
of these things implies the use of hammer, plane, and saw. 
Manual training work will certainly busy itself in the future with 
the making of these useful things rather than with the making 
of the quaint and the curious. The child can have a genuine 
motive in the making of these socially serviceable things. 

Besides being serviceable, things should be beautiful. Even 
if the perception of beauty be an intuitive thing (which is doubt- 

i This topic is so fully treated in modern pedagogical literature that the 
reader is referred to it for further discussion and details. 



220 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

ful), there is need of cultivating it. Here, again, visual percep- 
tion of the beautiful is inadequate. Motor realization is essen- 
tial to the development of a genuine appreciation of the beautiful. 
The cant and shallowness of art is found in those who repeat 
what others say, and who think that they have thereby ex- 
hausted the matter. 

The beautifying of things has an extremely high utility — is 
socially serviceable in the deepest, truest sense. Hence, training 
in the harmonious blending of colors, the selection and installation 
of decorations, the arrangement of furniture and furnishings — 
training in all these things tends to develop a genuine appreciation 
of the beautiful. These motor experiences are capable of being 
dissociated and recombined in new forms, thus widening one's 
genuine appreciation. And somewhere, sometime, at home or 
at school, every child should gain skill in beautifying things. 

(w) Nor can it be left to mere chance to determine whether 
the child shall learn about exchange. Descriptive matter may 
be temporarily understood but it will not be assimilated unless 
there is some concrete experience in terms of which it may be 
interpreted. Older persons have only to attempt to recall their 
arithmetical study of foreign exchange to verify the above. 
There is a mechanism of exchange socially and legally ordered, 
and no child should grow up in ignorance of it. Of course, with 
a minimum of actual experience, the child can imaginatively 
interpret processes of exchange which he can not possibly experi- 
ence. It is urged here that this minimum of actual experience 
be as large as possible. 

In what has been said under the heading, the imitation oj 
industrial and commercial processes, the effort has been to show 
that skill in these fundamental forms of social activity is abso- 
lutely necessary to the proper socialization of the child. This 
proper socialization includes expressive activity as well as passive 
interpretation. Power to do and motive to do socially service- 
able things are necessary elements of all true knowledge and of 
all worthy development. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE , 221 

(x) But over and beyond these fundamental things, every 
community has certain activities which are peculiar to it. Fully 
to appreciate this local social life one must imitate it. Hence, 
every community will demand more of imitation than has been 
outlined. It is not claimed that in all these cases skill should 
result. Also, some almost universal activities are too complex 
to be imitated closely by the child. They can be imitated only 
in a loose way. Such are the activities of the blacksmith, the 
shoemaker, the brickmaker, the printer, the carriage maker, etc. 
These activities may be appreciated, however, provided only 
that by imitation of simpler activities the child has acquired a 
stock of ideas in terms of which to interpret these very complex 
industrial processes. 

Summing up now what has been contended for in this dis- 
cussion : — Along many lines of industrial and commercial activity 
the child should gain a sense of what life is by conscious imita- 
tion. In no other way can he become broadly and thoroughly 
humanized. If the homes do not furnish opportunities for chil- 
dren to do these things, then the school should provide them. 

D. Individual achievement, distinction, and invention. 

Overlapping all the stages already treated and giving vitality 
to them is invention. Invention is simply the utilization of past 
experiences in a new way. It is present in the child's play when he 
changes the game to suit conditions other than those under which 
he first learned it. It is present in his make-believe and fancy 
and dramatization. Invention is that without which life is re- 
duced to the dead level of doing forever as others do. And yet 
it is only by doing as others do to a certain extent that one ever 
gets the power and the material of invention. Originality does 
not mean making new things out of nothing; it means making 
new things out of old things by putting the elements of the old 
together in new relations. 

Along with the exercise of originality comes a sense of in- 
dividual achievement, a sense of power to do, and a sense of 



222 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

being. This power to do is recognized by others and hence 
comes distinction— a feeling that others rely upon one's ability 
to bring things to pass. Social groups, from the "gang" to the 
nation, have ways of showing their appreciation of the one who 
can achieve old ends in new ways or new ends in original ways. 

This stage, or phase, of intellectual activity has, as has 
already been stated, very close connections with both feeling 
and volition. It deserves special consideration because so many 
teachers unconsciously tend to discourage it. A graduate of a 
normal school after a year's experience in teaching said: — "I've 
learned that a teacher should give one form for the solution of 
problems of a certain kind in arithmetic, and then have every 
child keep to that form." This simply means that the child who 
is able to invent is to have no chance in the arithmetic class. A 
fourth grade arithmetic class was struggling with this problem: 
— "Frank bought eight pears for fifty cents; he sold four of them 
at ten cents each; and the remainder he sold at five cents each: 
how much did he gain?" Most of the pupils reasoned thus: — 
four tens are forty; four fives are twenty; forty and twenty are 
sixty; sixty is ten more than fifty; therefore, etc. One boy, 
however, had a different solution. He said that "since eight 
pears cost fifty cents, four pears cost twenty-five cents; now, if 
four pears are sold for forty cents, the gain is fifteen cents; and 
if the other four are sold for twenty cents, the loss is five cents. 
Then the gain is fifteen cents less five cents, or ten cents." 
Strange as it may seem, the teacher did not understand the solu- 
tion and told the boy that his way was wrong. 

No doubt there must be some one form which is developed 
by the teacher, but there are few, if any, arithmetical processes 
which have only one correct form. And, after all, as Dr. Frank 
McMurry says, 1 it is the thinking involved in the process of solu- 
tion and not the answer which is valuable. Number relations 
having any great degree of complexity may be thought in differ- 
ent ways, each equally correct. The really valuable mental 

1 Method of the Recitation, p. 131. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 223 

activity in arithmetic is that which utilizes previous mathematical 
ideas in the solution of new problems. The child, however, 
will not long care to think about problems whose answers do not 
have a value for him. 

A fourth-grade class in history in the schools was learn- 
ing about Robertson and the settlement of Tennessee. The 
method was simply this : — The teacher told in a dramatic way 
a small portion of the story, and then asked, "Who can tell me 
what I have just told you?" The pupils responded vigorously 
enough, the fortunate ones being allowed to stand in front of the 
others and repeat as accurately as they could, just what the 
teacher had said. There was not a question by the pupils during 
the hour, nor was there any effort to have them think for them- 
selves. History should not be imitatively acquired by fourth 
grade pupils; rather there should be constructive imaginative 
thinking by each pupil, so guided and directed by the teacher 
that each child reconstructs for himself the historical sequence 
in its essential elements and relations. This idea is opposed by 
some historical scholars who make a knowledge of historical 
sequence the only thing sought in the teaching of history. For 
adults, scholarship as broad and accurate and deep as possible 
is desirable and should be insisted upon; but for pupils in the 
elementary grades the great thing is appreciation because of its 
formative influence; and appreciation is dependent upon the 
kind and amount of self-activity put forth. 

Inventiveness can be stimulated and directed by social 
criticism, and the teacher has a wonderful opportunity to direct 
the inventive tendencies of pupils. But along with this, as with 
all genuinely serviceable things, there is a danger. The sense 
of personal achievement and prowess may become unduly ex- 
panded, the child may become "inflated," "smart," "pert," 
"saucy," unruly and disobedient. Such children are not vicious, 
that is, they do not take pleasure in doing mean things or in 
annoying others — they simply have an undue sense of their own 
importance and relative worth. This condition is not an inevit- 



224 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

able one. If properly treated by others the child should not 
become inflated. But it is much better that the child should 
be inflated than that he should remain forever "collapsed"; for, 
after all, the world with which the child as an adult will have to 
deal, will soon teach him his true worth and his true position. 
Self-reliance is the thing desired, and it is better to secure it by 
a circuitous route than not to secure it at all. The fundamental 
proposition is: — Self-reliance can be built up only on the basis 
of achievement, of known power to perform; and this sense of 
prowess usually comes through invention rather than through 
imitation. 

There are manifold opportunities in the work of the school 
to spur children on to invention, provided the teacher can see 
and seize them. Verbal mastery strongly insisted upon is the 
strong point of many teachers ; it is also the death-knell of inven- 
tion. The test of being "busy" is perhaps the poorest test of 
'the efficiency of a school, for one may be busy without putting 
forth any genuine constructive effort. In fact, "busy work" 
has come to mean "something that keeps the children quiet." 
It is often felt that if the child has good lessons and does not 
cause any trouble, he is "getting along well." Very often, in 
such cases, the child is developing into a dull, prosaic, lifeless, 
wooden image of mediocrity. Some schools by their methods 
seem to put a premium upon stupidity. 

E. Causal thinking from sense-contact. 

There is another phase of development closely allied to the 
ones already discussed, viz., causal thinking in image terms. 
The following questions and answers illustrate this kind of 
thinking: — 

Why does the train move ? 

"The engine pulls it." 

Why does the engine pull ? 

"Because the wheels go round." 

Why do the wheels go round? 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 225 

"Because the steam makes them go round." 

Why is there steam? 

"Because there is fire in the engine." 

Each answer is an image of a something or other, and each 
answer is satisfactory to the child because his idea of force, if 
he has any at all, is an image of something that moves. Recently 
a four-year old girl exhibited her doll that closed its eyes when 
put to bed and that cried upon occasions. What makes it close 
its eyes? she was asked. The answer came without hesitation, 
"'Cause I put it down that way" (showing). And what makes 
it cry? " 'Cause I press it so" (showing again). 

This causal thinking in image terms is applied to things 
that are animate as well as to inanimate things. A little boy 
was once asked, Why does an acorn grow into a great oak tree ? 
He replied, " 'Cause there is a little oak tree in the acorn, and it 
keeps growing all the time." 

There is another kind of cause with which the child becomes 
acquainted early in his life, viz., human motive. A few questions 
and answers from classroom exercises will illustrate this kind of 
causal thinking. 

(1) Why did Boone decide to escape from the Indians? 
"Because he had heard the Indians making plans to capture 

Boonesborough." 

But why should Boone care if the Indians did capture 
Boonesborough ? 

"Because Boone's wife and daughter were there, and he 
did not want them to be carried off by the Indians." 

(2) Why are the British anxious to hold Gibraltar ? 
"They want to hold it so that in time of war they can keep 

the enemy's ships from passing into or out of the Mediterranean." 

Why do the British keep Malta? 

"Because it gives them a place to coal their ships as they go 
from Gibraltar to Suez." 

(3) Why didn't Grant march at once against Vicksburg 
from the south? 



226 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

"Because Johnson with a Confederate army was over near 
Jackson and might come up in Grant's rear." 

(4) Why did Robinson build a boat? 

" Because he wanted to explore the coast of the island." 

(5) Why did the little leaf feel sad? 

" Because it was left all alone on the tree, and the other 
leaves had all gone away." 

These illustrations show how the child explains things in 
terms of human motive. Human motive is perhaps the first 
cause, or force, with which the child becomes acquainted, and 
perhaps the most significant one, also. He finds it within him- 
self, and just to the extent that he thinks things as personalities, 
he finds motive in them. The child probably thinks his own 
motives in terms of motor images. He wants something to eat, 
and this want so quickly goes over into motor attitude that the 
two seem almost one. He wants to go skating and immediately 
his whole muscular system shows it. This is why children make 
such good beggars — they beg with their whole bodies and not 
merely with words. 

Having now shown what is meant by causal thinking in 
sense-contact terms, it should be stated that the purpose in intro- 
ducing it is to show why teachers should not expect younger 
children to explain things in their abstract causes. Concrete 
explanations are sufficient and efficient. Even adults, when 
they wish to make a matter perfectly clear, resort to concrete 
illustrations. 

This analysis of the sub-stages of image thinking is now 
completed, but nothing has been said about the sense-contact 
stage, the memory stage, or the imaginative stage. In a way these 
stages are really levels of intelligence. They may be expressed 
respectively as idea-getting, idea-reproducing, and idea-modify- 
ing levels. No one level could be without the other two, and 
no one actually precedes the others in consciousness. That 
is just what many teachers have failed to realize. Instead they 
have thought that children from seven to ten were adapted to 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 227 

observation; from ten to twelve, to memory; from twelve to 
fourteen, to imagination; or some other equally untrue and 
vicious age-and-mental-order has been put forth as a reality of 
developing consciousness. "The whole child comes to school," 
and it is to the reality of the child's expanding life that one must 
attend. After all, all classification is merely a matter of con- 
venience — the human way of expressing an appreciation of the 
fact that some things are alike and that some things are differ- 
ent. The most helpful classification is the best one; and the 
endeavor has been to group the child's image thinking into 
classes such that the teacher may the more fully understand him 
and the more effectively minister to his genuine development. 



CHAPTER XII. 

Stages of Knowledge and Stages of Instruction 
(Concluded). 

§ 51. sub-stages of concept thinking. 

It has been seen how the mind becomes possessed of images, 
and also some of the ways in which it uses them. There is, 
however, a process of comparing images by means of which the 
mind (1) attends to the like elements of the images, (2) thinks 
these likenesses apart from the images as wholes, and (3) synthe- 
sizes these likenesses into a new mental activity called a con- 
cept. When one by reflection finds the functions of these like 
elements, he regards them as essential or necessary. Hence, 
a concept is a mental activity symbolizing the essential relations 
of a group of actual or possible experiences which are thought 
of originally in image terms. It should also be evident that con- 
cepts may be formed on the basis of other concepts just as 
imagination combines images in new ways. The concept, while 
not like the images upon which it is based, is nevertheless con- 
nected with them in such a way that, if one fixes his attention 
upon a concept derived from images, it will reproduce those 
images in consciousness. The concept is not cut off from con- 
crete reality — it is simply the mind's way of "thinking the many 
into the one" ; or, as philosophers say, " finding unity in variety." 1 

A. Concept forming, classification, and definition. 

The "essential relations" in a concept are essential only to 
the mind that so regards them. People used to think that a bi- 

The reader is now able to understand Dewey's definition:— " A true con- 
cept is an organic unity, containing within its unity synthetic connection with 
all the diversity of objects to which it refers." Dewey's Psychology, p. 208, 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 229 

cycle must have a chain, a single seat, etc.; their concept was,, 
from the present truth about bicycles, erroneous ; but, at the time, 
they regarded chain, single seat, etc., as essentials. The activity 
of comparison grows right out of thinking by similarity; and 
hence, almost as soon as a child begins to re-think his experiences 
in terms of similarity, he begins to form concepts. These con- 
cepts are crude, childish; but they are important, for they show 
the tendency to group essentials together. 1 This process when 
referred to objects or to ideas is called classification. 

Then the reverse movement begins — that of giving the 
meaning of the concept. This giving of the meaning of the con- 
cept is definition, by which the essentials of a concept are set 
forth. Since the mind may form concepts unconsciously (or, 
at any rate, speedily lose all memory of the process), definition 
is an especially valuable mental operation, for by it the mind 
reflects upon its' own meanings. No one can or should define 
all his concepts; but one makes his own meanings clearer to 
himself by the effort to make them clear to others. 

Definition, as here considered, is by no means to be con- 
founded with the process of repeating definitions learned from 
books, for the value of the process lies in the reflection upon 
meaning rather than in the association by contiguity necessary 
to the learning of a word-sequence. And so the process of syn- 
thesizing essentials appreciated by comparison should be corre- 
lated with the process of definition. All instruction should seek 
to lead the child to this twofold thoughtfulness. 

All concept forming is a synthesis; all definition is an 
analysis. Words are symbols by which concepts and defini- 
tions are expressed. Single words express concepts and at the 
same time name: — (1) a class of objects, as bird, bacteria, ship; 
(2) a force, electricity, steam; ,(3) a quality, or attribute apart 
from the thing itself, blue, sweet, forcefully; (4) a relationship 
between ideas or objects, on, by, is. The child usually gets 
words at first as names, and by a process of conscious imitation ; 

i Hobhouse's Mind in Evolution, pp. 292 ff. 



230 .ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

but this gives him only the form phase of language. The con- 
tent phase of language is the thought, the meaning; and this 
meaning can come for one only through his own associative, 
reflective self-activity. If the mere getting of words as names 
were genuine learning, all methods of teaching could be reduced 
to the way in which parrots are trained to talk. Skill in teach- 
ing is the power to provoke associative, reflective self-activity in 
pupils. 

B. Judgment forming and opinion-making. 

Whenever one attempts to express his meaning or his 
thought about anything he uses words — not to name the things, 
but to express the relationship between the states or phases of 
consciousness. This inner mental perception of relationship 
between ideas or activities of the mind is judgment. Hence, 
definition is impossible without judgment. Definition is judg- 
ment-making; but not all judgment-making is definition. I am 
writing, expresses a judgment but not a definition; it is rather a 
description of my actions. Writing is a series of conventional- 
ized crooked marks used to express one person's thoughts to another, 
expresses a judgment and also a definition — it expresses an 
appreciation of what is meant by writing and is not simply a 
description of the process. It is evident from what has just 
been said that definition implies judgment; and if definition is 
analysis, then definition implies "analytic judgment." This 
means that the predicated part of the definition simply unfolds 
what is already implicit in the subject — it expresses what is 
meant by the subject. 

There is, however, another form of judgment which adds 
something to the thing thought about, associates an idea or 
group of ideas with that (or those) already being thought of. 
The pencil with which I am writing has a soft lead, expresses 
such a judgment. Such judgments are called " synthetic judg- 
ments" for their predicates add to (or unite with) their sub- 
jects. For this reason, synthetic judgments are also called 
descriptive judgments; and analytic judgments are called appre- 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 231 

ciative judgments. In conception and judgment the mind 
builds up a world for itself; or rather two worlds, the "world of 
appreciation" and the "world of description." Neither world 
is complete in itself. 

Having now seen the relation of judgment to one phase of 
conception, viz., the relation of the analytic judgment to defini- 
tion, "the pedagogy of the concept" may be taken up. 

1. The concept is a product of the reflective activity, of 
comparison, abstraction, and synthesis. Hence, the teacher 
should strive to induce in his pupils the mental activities just 
mentioned. The practical question is, How may this be done ? 

Under the discussion of invention some suggestions were 
made that are valuable in answering this question. Also, in 
the discussion of questioning it was shown that the kind of 
mental activity on the part of pupils is largely dependent upon 
the character of the teacher's questions. Moreover, there is 
something in the general attitude of the teacher — a something 
extremely difficult to define but all important in the vital process 
of education. This attitude is impossible without a thorough 
and enthusiastic knowledge of the thing to be taught, of the way 
to teach it, of the value of it to the one being taught; impossible 
without a sympathy for child life and children's interests; im- 
possible without a higher interest in teaching than that of mak- 
ing a living by it. A teacher with all the positive things implied 
in this series of negations will judge of the value of his work by 
the amount and intensity of the thinking done by his pupils and 
the consequent change in selfhood which these imply. Such a 
teacher is forever inciting pupils to do things for themselves. 

2. It should be noted, also, thai the kind of thinking here 
discussed is the kind that has built up all the science the world 
has ever known. A mere knowledge of facts about plants, or 
bees, or birds, or number relations, or the solar system, is not 
science. This knowledge of facts is a necessary basis for science, 
but science emerges only when these facts are connected by 
relations which are regarded as essential. Similarly, a knowl- 



232 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

edge of the facts of history and geography is necessary as a basis 
for appreciation, but this knowledge is not the appreciation; and 
no one will deny that this appreciation is the raison d'etre (rea- 
son for being) of the study of these subjects. Pupils should not 
memorize science; they should think it out for themselves. And, 
hence, a teacher should so environ the child, so stimulate him 
by questions and suggestions, and so order and arrange the 
things he teaches that the child will synthesize the (to him) 
essentials into a unity. It is only by and through this thinking 
for himself that the child can ever realize his true nature and 
become truly social. 

3. But, having reached this conceptual activity of mind, 
the child should at once return to individuals, to images, for he 
can now see the individual in light of its essential and universal 
relations. "The more one knows, the more he can see in his 
daily experiences." A farmer who knows how bacteria aid in 
the sprouting of seeds sees more in this phenomenon than he 
who simply knows that seeds sprout. To a cabinet-maker who 
knows how oak is "quarter sawed," the oak which he uses 
means much more than to one who works without this knowl- 
edge. And it is so always and everywhere, "To him that hath 
shall be given." 

Thus, along with the growth of concepts, comes a saner, 
truer view of things; the person becomes "mature"; that is, 
his view of things is no longer that of the child. This maturity 
can come only through the interpretation of experience in light 
of its essential relations. To consider the process ended when 
the concept has been reached is to leave the pupil in mid-air, is 
to roll stones to the top of a hill only to have them roll down again. 
Pupils should constantly see more in life, think more independ- 
ently, feel more nobly, and act more ethically as a result of teach- 
ing or else the effort is in vain. 

4. The teacher should realize, however, that some things 
necessary to be taught are not of this conceptual character. 
Some signs or symbols and some facts must be taught as bases 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 233 

for thinking. Every concept or mental activity should have its 
correlative form of expression, and the3e forms can be acquired 
only by sheer association. The teacher who realizes this will 
be able to discriminate, and insist on forms only as they are 
related to thinking. In general, concepts or meanings should 
precede their appropriate forms of expression for these latter 
are, as already shown, highly conventional in character. Imita- 
tion is a great factor in development, but not in what is called 
conceptual development, for the latter is a thing of self-activity 
in the reflective form. 

5. From what has been said regarding "the pedagogy of 
the concept," it should be clear that the concept is an aid to 
thinking (for it allows one to think the essentials of the many 
in one mental act), to the expression of thought (as contrasted* 
with image activities), and to the process called apperception 
because the concept enables one more effectively to pick out the 
essentials in a new experience. The teacher can only indirectly 
stimulate the formation of concepts; he can ask questions, offer 
suggestions, and give directions which lead the pupil to the proc- 
ess of comparison. No amount of lecturing, no amount of com- 
mitting to memory can produce concepts. Hence, teachers should 
confine their efforts to the few really helpful things they can do. 

A consideration of "the pedagogy of the synthetic judg- 
ment" is now to be undertaken. It has already been seen that 
this form of judgment adds a predicate to a subject and thus 
describes it. The practical question is, How may the child be 
led to perform this mental activity? 

1. Imitation is one great way. The mother tells the child 
that the flower is pretty, is blue, is sweet, etc., and he repeats 
after her, "The flower is pretty," "The flower is blue," etc. 
He may have the same idea of the predicate as his mother has, 
and in this case he is really judging imitatively; or he may have 
an erroneous idea of the predicate, and in such cases he is prob- 
ably just going through the form of judging, making the sounds 
but not the appropriate mental associations. 



234 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

The process is not much different when the child reads. 
He may re-think the judgments or he may just repeat the word- 
sequence. This "short circuit between eye-stimulus and vocal 
response" is very likely to occur as soon as the child has gained 
a fair control of the technical phases of reading, and it is one 
that must be guarded carefully against during all use of books. 
The sentence of the book should be a challenge to one's intelli- 
gence to find the appropriate meaning or idea-equivalent. It 
is only fair to say, however, that in many cases there is no chal- 
lenge about it. How many would be puzzled by the phrase, 
"tea served in egg-shell Spode cups?" 1 The adjective Spode 
is the part that bothers. 

This is but a single illustration of what is going on all the 
time when people read — equivalent idea-realities are not forth- 
coming; and the habit of slipping over the words can be easily 
formed. A pupil ran across the phrase, "a lecture on Calcu- 
lus," and thought calculus to be a man, a philosopher of the 
time of Socrates. 2 Unless one gets the proper ideas from the 
symbols his reading is in vain. In short, the things one reads 
should serve to stimulate his own processes of judgment. 

2. Discovery is another mode of forming synthetic judg- 
ments. Modern education is shot through and through with 
efforts to have pupils discover attributes of things and then 
form judgments which affirm these attributes of the subjects. 
In a class in nature study, the pupils examine the object and 
report their discoveries in synthetic judgments. Something like 
this is often heard about the dandelion: — 

The dandelion grows close to the ground. 

It has a yellow flower. 

The flower is made up of a lot of little flowers arranged 
together. 

The flower grows on a thin hollow stem. 

Any object or process which the children can directly ob- 
serve is described by means of synthetic judgments. 

1 The Adventures of Oliver Horn, pp. 34. 

2Perhaps the text was in error in spelling the word with a capital letter. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 235 

In such subjects as geography and history, the pupils will 
form synthetic judgments if the subject is presented orally and 
according to the developing method. Take, for illustration, 
this selection from a fourth-grade history class: — 

When the women at the fort saw the Indians carrying the 
girls into the woods, how would they feel ? 

"They would be scared and sorry, too." 

What would they want to do ? 

"Tell the men in the fields about it." 

How could they do this ? 

"Someone could go to the men and tell them." "They 
could hang out a white cloth as a sign." "They could ring a 
bell or blow a horn." 

It is clearly impracticable that all teaching should be by 
this method. Pupils must learn to use books. This is readily 
granted, but may one, even with the use of books, still have this 
independent discovery of the predicates appropriate to the sub- 
jects? May the teacher still secure constructive thinking on 
the part of pupils ? If so, how ? 

The matter will be treated negatively at first. 

(a) Constructive thinking (which includes reflection, dis- 
covery, and invention) can not be secured by making memory 
work seem to the pupil to be the thing he must perform. If 
literature is being taught, the memorizing of large or small por- 
tions of it will tend to centre the attention upon the form rather 
than upon the content. The memorizing should follow, not 
precede, the appreciation of literature. In geography, "loca- 
tive geography" strongly insisted upon and long continued 
tends away from constructive thinking. Children should know 
where some places are, but in this alone there is little, if any- 
thing, of value. Location is significant only in relation to other 
qualities or facts about a place. The same argument applies 
to history, arithmetic, and grammar. This point may be stated 
in another way by saying that insistence upon form before con- 
tent is appreciated tends to prevent constructive thinking. 



236 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(b) The overwillingness of the teacher to help the child 
over the difficulties, to put words into his mouth, to suggest the 
appropriate predicates or modifiers develops dependence in 
thinking, develops imitation in judgment which, as already 
pointed out, retards conceptual and judgment development. 

(c) The failure of the teacher to apply consciously the 
principle of apperception in preparation for the new, in com- 
paring the new with what is already known, and in the inter- 
pretation of the new, leads the child to master the new as an 
isolated thing. And this learning of an isolated, unrelated 
thing demands thinking by contiguity. It is said that no iso- 
lated thing can exist in the mind. This is undoubtedly true, 
but the relation by virtue of which it exists there, may be of any 
degree of weakness or of strength. Contiguity is weak. "It 
is the first resort of a weak teacher, and the last resort of a strong 
one." 

Considering the matter positively, some ways in which the 
teacher may secure constructive thinking may be formulated. 

(a) It has already been shown how the teacher may stimu- 
late discovery and invention in pupils. Fundamentally this is 
done by so adjusting the difficulty of the new thought that the 
child can overcome it and reach the new thought for himself. 
In this process the teacher's business is simply to provide the 
opportunity and afford the stimulus to the child. Before he can 
do these things in the most effective way the teacher must have 
organized the subject matter into a series of related parts, and 
then must ask questions that stimulate reflective thinking. 
There is no objection to the study of a textbook by pupils before 
the recitation period, provided the teacher leads them to think 
for themselves during the recitation. This preliminary study of 
a book should afford so much material for genuine, progressive, 
constructive thinking; and the thinking should be more effec- 
tive in consequence of this advance study of a textbook. But 
just as soon as the teacher resorts to the expedient of "finding 
out if pupils have studied their lessons" by asking them to repro- 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 237 

duce just what they studied, he employs a method that is the 
reverse of constructive. 

(b) Constructive thinking may also be stimulated by mak- 
ing large use of comparison in teaching. Comparison, as 
already pointed out, is a process of discovering similarities. To 
the extent, therefore, that the teacher can stimulate his pupils 
to comparison, to that extent he can provoke or awaken construc- 
tive thinking. This idea has taken the form of a pedagogical 
maxim: — "Learn one thing thoroughly and refer everything 
else to it." In one way this is impossible, for there is no one 
thing to which all things can be referred, unless it be a system 
of metaphysics. A system of metaphysics, however, is, despite 
some recent efforts to introduce "post-graduate work" into the 
grades, an impossibility for the pupils in elementary schools. If, 
however, the maxim means: — "Learn one thing thoroughly and 
learn all similar things by comparing them with it," it is 
perfectly valid. For illustration: — Study North America as 
a continent and then study other continents by comparing 
them with it; study one method of mining in great detail and 
other methods by comparison; study one campaign of the 
Civil War in its causal relations and other campaigns by 
comparison. This process is not only a time-saver; it is a 
thought-producer. 

(c) Another thing that will tend to stimulate constructive 
thinking is proceeding as slowly as pupils can think. Schools 
have, in some measure, caught the "get-rich-quick" fever. 
There are ever so many more things to teach than there were a 
few years ago, but there is no more time in which to teach them. 
Hence, there is constant pressure and haste. Teachers, per- 
fectly familiar with the thinking their pupils are performing for 
the first time, are inclined to forget or underestimate the diffi- 
culty, and to "push the child along." In reality, such pushing 
is "pulling the child back," for by it his attention is distracted. 
Continuity of attention is the sine qua non of constructive think- 
ing. The teacher who asked his pupils seventy-seven questions 



238 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

in ten minutes rendered constructive thinking impossible during 
that period. 

(d) Finally, a frank, sincere, sympathetic, appreciative 
attitude of teacher toward pupil will prove a powerful stimulus 
to constructive thinking. This attitude is that which gives the 
child the sense of freedom, gives him the feeling that whatever 
he may have to offer will be respected and not be "laughed out 
of court." This attitude is genuinely free from any taint of 
sarcasm or ridicule, is genuinely honest and honorable. The 
child does not analyze the influence of this attitude upon him- 
self — he simply feels it. He feels no trace of fear, does not 
"hate to recite," and enters into school work with the same 
spontaneous enthusiasm and zest with which he coasts or skates. 
Without this attitude of both teacher and pupil all skill is but 
a makeshift. 

Synthetic judgments are formed by the child either by a 
process of imitation or by a process of discovery; and discovery 
implies constructive thinking. Through the process of judgment 
the child comes to know the truth; and it is this knowledge of the 
truth that makes him free. As he grows in knowledge of the 
truth the child inevitably comes to form opinions for himself. 
He forms opinions of things, events, relationships, social prac- 
tices, the worth of himself and others. This opinion-making is 
simply the synthetic judgment by which the child imposes his 
standards of value upon his own ideas, and by which he asso- 
ciates together the ideas which he has already acquired. 

In this process of opinion-making the child is unconsciously 
influenced by the opinions of those with whom he associates. 
The reason for this is not difficult to analyze. The child gets 
most of his system of values by unconsciously appropriating the 
values of others as he hears them and sees them expressed. In- 
vention is possible and accounts for the gradual change of what 
we call public opinion. The child, however, changes his opin- 
ions largely because of the opinions of those with whom he asso- 
ciates. How much of annoyance teachers have endured simply 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 239 

because the "bell ewe" of their flocks has whispered it about 
that the "teacher is simply a horrid old thing!" And how much 
of adoration and devotion they have received because it was 
noised abroad that "the teacher is just fine!" 

And yet there comes a time of relative independence in 
opinion-making. This independence implies a relative ma- 
turity, and has a considerable value in development. Independ- 
ence in thinking does not mean thinking as no one else thinks; 
it means thinking for one's self. It demands that one shall get 
all available data and carefully consider it bit by bit before mak- 
ing his judgment. Independent opinion-making is a unifying, 
organizing activity. The teacher's function with respect to 
it is three-fold, viz., (1) leading the child to build up worthy and 
adequate standards of judging, or standards of value; (2) in- 
fluencing the child so that he desires to get all available data 
regarding a given subject, object, or topic; and (3) building up 
within the child a habit of considering carefully all the data be- 
fore forming his opinions. 

Opinion-making is a judgment as to the worth of things 
while what is ordinarily called judgment affirms an attribute 
without any relation to its worth (and this is true whether the 
judgment be analytic or synthetic). But, in a sense, all analytic 
and all synthetic judgments are simply so much material in 
terms of which one pries into the worth of things. It is not a 
knowledge of the attributes, qualities, and forms of things, nor 
yet an appreciation of their meanings by one that influences his 
conduct; rather one's appreciation of the worth of things for 
himself and his appreciation of the worth of things for others 
influences, yes, determines his conduct. And opinion-making 
is the initial stage in the process of building up one's view of his 
relation to the universe. 

C. Causal thinking and the formation of personal attitudes. 

In studying the formation of concepts it was seen that the 
child synthesizes elements regarded as essential. Judgment 



240 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

refines and purines these concepts, "makes them flexible, and 
gives them an additional worth. Inevitably the child comes to 
appreciate the fact that all things change, that all things are 
dynamic. Back of all this flux and flow of changes there must 
be a something, or some things. These somethings are called 
forces, or causes. The child's first idea of cause or force is of 
the image type, is concrete; but gradually he comes to form 
genuine concepts of certain forces or causes. Gradually he 
forms concepts of heat, steam, electricity, magnetism, chemical 
affinity, gravity, etc. Having reached these concepts, the child 
is able to explain certain phenomena in causal terms, he is able 
to understand things in their dynamic relations. He sees that 
iron sinks in water and that cork floats in it because of the 
different intensities of the force of gravity upon bodies of differ- 
ent densities. He sees that gravity, heat, the earth's rotation, 
and surface features control cyclonic movements. The child 
comes to appreciate the principle of the barometer and under- 
stands how it may be used to measure the height of mountains. 
He studies into the causal relations of the compass and appre- 
ciates its value to the mariner. The whole realm of inanimate 
nature takes on a new meaning as the child comes to see great 
world-forces behind phenomena that formerly seemed to him to 
be governed by chance; and the whole realm of human adapta- 
tion to inanimate nature becomes as entrancing as a fairy tale. 

But this force-world, in order to be of greatest service to 
men, must be controlled and measured. Machines are human 
means of controlling these forces and of measuring them. Con- 
trol is qualitative, or descriptive; measuring is quantitative. 
And in this distinction there is vast significance for the teacher 
in the elementary school, for the child in the grades is interested 
in the qualitative aspects of causes and not in their quantitative 
aspects. He may be interested in the action of the barometer 
as connected with his weather observations or with the adven- 
tures of explorers; but it is almost impossible to interest him in 
the corrections necessary to the exact reading of a barometer. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 241 

He is interested in knowing that iron expands when heated, but 
not in finding "the linear co-efficient of the expansion of iron." 

Even older pupils balk at the determination of the quanti- 
tative phases of these great world-forces, for they fail to see just 
where this exact, quantitative knowledge exerts any power on 
their individual lives. With older scientific students the case 
is different for they can see the bearing of this ability to deter- 
mine accurately the quantitative phases of forces upon their 
future successes. In short, the relation of the qualitative 
aspects of forces to their utilization by men is more easily appre- 
hended than is the relation of the quantitative aspects of these 
same forces. 

Confining now one's attention to the needs of pupils in the 
elementary schools, it is evident that the teacher should strive 
for: (1) fairly distinct concepts of these various world-forces 
based upon the inductive examination of them in operation 
either as they are in nature or as they are conditioned in simple 
qualitative experiments ; (2) a wide interpretation of natural facts 
and human adaptations to natural facts in light of these concepts. 
Pupils in the elementary school have too little ability in manipu- 
lation, too little of motor control, to secure results that are valid 
as bases for quantitative determinations; and also, they have 
no equipment, either in interest or in mathematical ability, ade- 
quate to an educative determination of the quantitative laws of 
forces. The greater value lies in appreciation of these forces as 
related to life, in appreciation of the various ways in which men 
utilize world-forces for their own benefit. 

And there is ample opportunity in elementary school work 
to exercise pupils in this kind of thinking. Nature study is 
rich in materials; so, too, geography. The study of industries, 
which is constantly increasing in one form or another in schools, 
also offers an excellent field for this highly valuable form of 
thinking. The best teaching of history is that which empha- 
sizes the causal element. The cause, or force in history, how- 
ever, is usually human motive rather than inanimate force, and 



242 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

hence, even its qualitative results can not be accurately pre- 
dicted; the qualitative results of historical forces can be predicted 
merely as possibilities. But the attitude of mind which seeks to 
grasp the causal idea and to predict its effects is the attitude of 
well-balanced independence — an attitude so genuinely service- 
able that it should not be omitted from elementary education. 

These world-forces, however, are not the only forces which 
the child understands. He finds himself related to them, 
dependent upon them and limited by them in many ways; but 
within himself there is developing a sense of his own power of 
adaptation to these forces. The development of this sense gives 
rise to the formation of personal attitudes. The child sees 
others controlling these forces, limited by them, and even con- 
trolled by them, and so the question as to what he is to do arises 
in his consciousness. His knowledge is not wide enough to 
enable him to give to this question an answer having the highest 
validity; but he does give it some sort of an answer, and, in so 
far as he is able, he strives to live out his answer in personal 
attitudes. 

The formation of genuinely serviceable attitudes is the 
essential end of the educative process; all things else are but 
means to this end; this is "the last, for which the first was made." 
To build a conceptual order, to unmask things and discover 
their real nature and relationships, to know the meanings of 
things — these are great achievements indeed; but they are "as 
sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal" if, using them as so 
many stepping stones, the child does not, of his own initiative, 
get into right relations with Nature and with Man. 

D. Logical thinking and systematization. 

In all of the child's causal thinking the real nature, or 
essence, of force eludes him. Force is known only through its 
manifestations, its ways of behaving; and there is always a pos- 
sibility that it may behave differently. To illustrate: — All the 
iron one has ever heated, or heard of being heated, has seemed 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 



243 



to respond to heat by expanding. There might, however, be 
a piece of iron so tempered or heated or electrified that further 
heat applied would not cause it to expand. If there were such 
a piece of iron, it would behave so differently from what one has 
previously called iron behaves that he would hesitate to call it 
iron. But, assuming that iron expands when heated, any par- 
ticular piece of iron must expand when heated — it is necessary 
that it should do so, for expanding when heated is an essential 
mode of iron behavior. Just what heat is in its essence no one 
knows; nor does anyone know the "true inwardness'' of iron 
except in so far as he assumes that its behavior under different 
circumstances is a revelation of its essence, or nature. But, 
granting these things about iron and about heat to be true, 
one can predict with absolute certainty what iron will do when 
heat is applied to it — yes, what iron must do. 
Take another well-worn illustration: — 

(1) All A is B. 

(2) All C is A. 

(3) .'. All C is B. 

If all A has a characteristic called B, and all C has the 
characteristic called A, then of necessity all C must have the 
characteristic called B. All C may indeed have many other 
characteristics, but this characteristic called B it must have. 
One may illustrate this necessary rela- 
tion by a diagram. Since all A is B, 
this relation may be expressed by put- 
ting all A as a circle within the circle 
B. It is also true that all C is A, and 
this may be expressed by putting all 
C within the circle A. Speaking sim- 
ply in terms of the diagram, if C is with- 
in A, and A is within B, then C is of 
necessity within B. The thought necessity is, of course, merely 
symbolized by this arrangement of circles. 

Suppose now that the second proposition were, "All C is 




244 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

B." Where should the circle be drawn to show this truth? 
Anywhere within the circle B; but one can not tell whether it 
should be so drawn as to overlap A. And what conclusion can 
be drawn from the two propositions ? 

If (1) All A is B, 

and (2) All C is B. 

then, (3) (a) All C may be A. 

(b) Some C may be A. 

(c) All A may be C. 

(d) Some A may be C. 

These conclusions express possibilities, not necessities. Still, 
the possibilities are, as a whole, inevitable or necessary from the 
given relations. 

Take another illustration and draw the circles for yourself. 

(1) AllXisY. 

(2) NoZisY. 

(3) .* . No Z is X, and no X is Z. The conclusions are both 
necessary. 

It is not the purpose to treat of this matter as do the books 
on logic; rather, it is to show by means of these simple illustra- 
tions what is meant by logical thinking. Whenever and wher- 
ever the mind reaches conclusions because of the relation of neces- 
sity between the terms of separated judgments, we have what is 
called logical thinking. To make this perfectly clear, consider 
an absurd illustration: — 

(1) All true gentlemen curl their hair. 

(2) Mr. Doge does not curl his hair. 

(3) .*. Mr. Doge is not a true gentleman. 

Grant the truth of the first two propositions and the third is 
necessarily true. Logical thinking thus reveals the necessary 
relations among judgments. 

Since logical thinking has the function just assigned to it, 
it is evident that as an explicit phase of consciousness it develops 
later than does any one of the mental activities which have been dis- 
cussed in this chapter. In its implicit aspect, however, it reaches 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 245 

down into almost the simplest mental processes. Logical 
thinking is present in the perception of any object. The syllo- 
gism of perception is as follows : — 

(1) All objects that affect me in the ways x, y, z, etc., are 
called oranges. 

(2) The object now before me affects me in the ways 
x, y, z, etc. 

(3) Therefore, the object now before me is an orange. 
Logical thinking is present in memory, and under this syl- 
logism : — 

(1) All mental activities which have a certain peculiar 
warmth and feeling value I call memories. 

(2) My present mental activity has this certain warmth and 
feeling value. 

(3) Therefore, my present mental activity is a memory. 

All inductive reaching of conclusions has this logical think- 
ing implicit in it. In inductive thinking use is made of the so- 
called "principle of the uniformity of nature," by which is 
meant that whatever is found to be true of several individuals 
selected from different and typical relations to other things, 
is also true of all objects of that class. For illustration: — One 
finds that several thistle plants growing in different kinds of 
soil bear flowers only in the second season of their growth. If 
nature is uniform in the sense explained above, then all thistles 
bear flowers only in the second year of their growth. But the 
individuals thus selected may not be typical ones. For illus- 
tration: — A boy has learned by genuine experience that the 
teachers who have taught him were cross and unfair. Relying, 
perhaps unconsciously, upon this principle of uniformity, he 
concludes that all teachers are cross and unfair. His experience 
has not been sufficiently typical to warrant the conclusion, to 
give it the validity of necessity for all men. 

As the child grows in power of judgment and in power of 
reflection, he gains the power to make this element of necessary 
relation an explicit thing in his consciousness. Ordinary 



246 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

courses of instruction recognize this and include materials 
which can be mastered only by logical thinking. Mathematics 
has long been regarded as the best means for the development 
of "logical thought;" and the classic languages and the grammar 
of the mother tongue have been regarded in the same way. In 
elementary schools arithmetic and grammar are taught. It 
may be profitable to trace out how these subjects afford oppor- 
tunity for logical thinking. 

Arithmetic has long been held in high esteem because the 
problems which constitute so large a part of it demand for their 
solution the perception of certain relationships which are not 
evident from the simple statement of the problem. The value 
of the study lies in this perception of relationship and the applic- 
ability of similar relationships to practical, everyday affairs. It 
is worth while to examine a few typical problems, beginning with 
very simple ones, to find the logical thinking involved in them. 
"If an apple costs 2\ cents how much will four apples cost?" 
It is assumed that each apple costs 2J cents, for without this 
assumption no one could tell the cost of four apples until after 
he had bought them. Assuming this, the reasoning has the 
character of necessity as the following propositions show: — 

(1) One apple costs 2| cents. 

(2) Four apples cost four times as much as one apple. 

(3) Therefore, four apples cost four times 2J cents, or 10 
cents. 

Take the problem which is the reverse of this one. 

"If four apples cost 10 cents, what is the cost of each 
apple?" 

Again it is assumed that each apple costs as much as every 
other. Granting this, one can easily arrange the propositions 
to show the relation of necessity: — 

(1) Four apples cost 10 cents. 

(2) One apple costs one-fourth as much as four apples. 

(3) Therefore, one apple costs one-fourth of 10 cents, or 
2J cents. 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 247 

Consider a more complicated problem. 
"A, owning f of a mill, sold A of his share for $4,500; what is 
the worth of the mill?" 

A sold i of | of the mill, or & of the mill, for $4,500. 

(1) ¥ 3 o of the mill is worth $4,500. 

(2) ¥ V of the mill is worth £ as much as ¥ 3 ¥ of it is worth. 

(3) Therefore, & of the mill is worth } of $4,500, or 
$1,500. 

Here begins another series of propositions, as follows: — 

(1) ¥ V of the mill is worth $1,500. 

(2) The whole mill is worth forty times as much as ¥ V of it 
is worth. 

(3) Therefore, the whole mill is worth forty times $1,500, 
or $60,000. 

In ordinary analyses of such problems not all the proposi- 
tions are set forth with the fullness given here; but one's thinking 
includes all the steps by which the necessary relations are dis- 
covered. 

Enough illustrations have been given to show that the solu- 
tion of arithmetical problems demands logical thinking. The 
facts of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division do 
not require this kind of thinking. No matter how well one 
understands the fact that 2 and 2 are four, he can give no reason 
for it except that is it so. And, understanding the facts of these 
four fundamental processes, the sooner they become habitual 
in their symbolical form the better for the child. Such a thing 
as this, "Multiply 7,684 by 287 and divide the product by 593," 
is no genuine problem; it is simply an example. It simply 

7,684 X 287 9 ~ . . „ /. 

means: — — = ? One speaks ot working exam- 

OcJo 

pies" because he does by habitual processes all that is required. 
One speaks of "solving problems" because he transforms them 
into examples by getting the necessary relations by means of 
logical thinking. 

In consequence of this character of arithmetical problems 



248 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

it is seen that the popular estimate of the value of arithmetic 
is based upon valid grounds. If this logical thinking in mathe- 
matics could insure that one would manifest it in all his thinking 
about other things, then, of course, all should be forced to sub- 
mit to its rigorous discipline. But training in mathematics 
has this wider value only to the extent of "serviceably associated 
habit." A man might take highest honors in mathematics in 
his school and college course, and then be induced to pay a 
foolishly exorbitant price for the right to sell a "patent end-gate 
for wagons" in a county devoted to grazing, or for the exclusive 
right to sell photographs of John Brown in Manchuria. If, 
however, the habit of thinking logically is extended to include 
other things and relationships than those of mathematics, it 
should be based upon these other things so that it may have the 
greatest value. 

One can also now see why arithmetic has lost its former 
prestige in elementary schools. Just to the extent that teachers 
have succeeded in organizing other subjects of the curriculum 
into a series of problems demanding the perception of necessary 
relationship between judgments (or even probable relationships), 
just to that extent has it been less necessary to spend so much 
time on arithmetic. History, when taught by the method of 
memorizing the textbook, had little value; but as it is now 
taught in the best schools it requires a kind of thinking closely 
allied to logical thinking. The same is true of geography. 
Locative geography, map questions, map drawing — if made the 
chief things in geography work — have a relatively low utility in 
genuine development of mental power; but when geography is 
taught in its causal connections, as a series of problems, it has 
an extremely high value as a means to the development of 
efficient social individuals. 

It can also be seen why arithmetic is hard for some pupils. 
Either they are so impatient for results that they "emulate the 
activity of the beheaded hen," or else they have no power to 
detect necessary relationships between the quantitative data 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 249 

given and those required. This latter difficulty is usually the 
result of an error of teaching. The teacher allows or encourages 
the pupil to attack problems as he attacks examples — mechan- 
ically. That this has been the teacher's practice is shown by 
the marvelous answers pupils report for "miscellaneous prob- 
lems." And the arrangement of many textbooks — twenty-five 
or thirty problems together requiring the same kind of solution 
— is a thing that fosters this mechanical work in arithmetic. 

The subject of English grammar will now be examined 
to see what opportunity it affords for logical thinking. 

Whether grammar be taught by the method of memorizing 
definitions or by the method of inductive development, the appli- 
cation of these definitions to sentences is an element that has 
great value. This application of definitions to sentences is 
either a valueless guess or else it is logical thinking. Take a sen- 
tence and analyze the answers to questions that may be asked 
about its parts. 

"The early bird catches the worm." 

Why is this a sentence ? 

"It is a sentence because it expresses a thought by means 
of words." 

If one analyze this answer he will find the propositions: — 

(1) A sentence expresses a thought by means of a series 
of words. 

(2) This series of words expresses a thought. 

(3) Therefore, this series of words is a sentence. 
What part of speech is early f 

"Early is an adjective." Again one finds: — 

(1) Any word that names a quality of a substantive is an 
adjective. 

(2) Early names a quality of the substantive bird. 

(3) Therefore, early is an adjective. 

What is the relation of the word worm to the verb catches? 
"Worm is the direct object of catches." Again, the reason- 
ing is: — 



250 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

(1) The word which names the object upon which an 
action expressed by a transitive verb terminates is a direct 
object. 

(2) Worm names the object upon which the action expressed 
by the transitive verb catches terminates. 

(3) Therefore, worm is the direct object of catches. 

These illustrations show that one phase of grammar de- 
mands logical thinking. The opportunities for this same kind 
of thinking appear to a wonderful degree in the study of Latin. 
Someone has said, "Csesar is little more than an excellent drill 
in the rules of the subjunctive." It most certainly could be 
taught in such a way that this would be true of it. Old men 
extol the values of parsing every word of Paradise Lost, because 
in parsing, the possible variations of the form of the word are 
all set out; and this process is either sheer memory or else it is 
the application of a rule or principle by means of logical thinking. 

Allusion has already been made to the change that has come 
about in the methods of teaching grammar. If definitions are 
merely memorized from a book, the pupil can do nothing but 
guess. It is realized that "memorized grammar" is not worth 
the effort it costs, and in its stead teachers have put an inductive 
examination of the functions of words in sentences. It is also 
realized that the logical thinking demanded in grammar is too 
difficult for pupils in the fourth and fifth grades, and difficult 
enough for pupils above these grades. Gradually there has 
come a division of the subject into language and grammar. 
Habit is all powerful in language but not in grammar. The 
child is equipped with correct language habits in the lower 
grades, and to the higher grades is left the examination of the 
necessary relations and functions of words in sentences. 

Logical thinking has another relation to the process of edu- 
cation. It has already been seen how personal attitudes are 
formed. Back of these personal attitudes which the child forms 
are judgments which have certain necessary relations to each other. 
The progressive appreciation of these necessary relations is the 
process of system atization. The child begins to realize that if 



STAGES OF KNOWLEDGE 251 

certain things are true then certain other things must necessarily 
be true. This realization of necessary truth is not confined to 
arithmetic and grammar — there is a logic of life. This logic 
of life usually appears in a mild form before the child has fin- 
ished the elementary school, but it never is completed therein. 
It demands a wider range of experience than the schoolroom 
can ever give. Secondary schools, colleges, and universities 
equip one with knowledge and suggest systematization, but a 
systematization that is formed without the actual experience of 
making one's way in the world has little value or potency. 

The teacher in the elementary school has two distinct func- 
tions with respect to this tendency in his pupils to form a philoso- 
phy of life, viz., (1) to guard them against the formation of a 
vicious one, and (2) to suggest to them, by and through his own 
philosophy of life as exemplified in his daily conduct, a sane, 
wholesome, social, serviceable, ethical view of life. It is not 
wise to impose a philosophy of life or a logic of life upon pupils, 
for the whole value of such a view of one's relation to the known 
universe and of the relations of one section of the universe to 
another lies in the logical, progressive, constructive thinking 
by the individual himself. It is this appreciation, and not 
imitation that has validity. Suggestions and questions to 
awaken thoughts about these high things are in place in schools, 
but a set solution of them, to be learned imitatively by pupils, 
is a prostitution of the influences of a public educational 
system. Authority may prevail in some conditions and, under 
certain circumstances, in all conditions; but, in the intellectual 
apprehension of the logic of life, the great thing is for each per- 
son to think for himself. This will not produce chaos; rather 
it will produce the only intellectual unity that is serviceable at 
all — the unity that forever seeks for higher and better things. 

SUMMARY. 

In these long and highly analytic chapters on Stages of 
Knowledge and Stages of Instruction, two things have been 



252 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

attempted, viz., (1) an analysis of the chief stages in development 
of the knowledge process; and (2) a consideration of the demands 
made upon school instruction by the nature of these stages. 
Knowledge becomes progressively more and more ideal, 1 for it 
begins in bondage to sense impressions and ends by system- 
atizing all known science and feelings into a consistent view of 
the universe and of the individual's relation to this universe. 
The progressive character of knowledge therefore demands that 
the teacher (1) stimulate, exercise, foster the stages of knowl- 
edge ascendant at the time, (2) conserve all the truly valuable 
elements of the stages that have already appeared, and (3) 
stimulate, at the proper time and in the proper way, the stage 
of thinking which will (a) increase the significance of the knowl- 
edge already acquired and (b) unfold to the thinker a new and 
higher view of reality. These demands should be met by the 
teacher who, of course, uses the course of study, the discipline 
of the school, and his own personality as means to the realiza- 
tion of these clearly conceived ends. 

l Dewey's Psychology, pp. 83, 84. 



CHAPTER XIII. 
Class Interest and Attention. 

§ 52. introductory and description. 

It should now be perfectly evident that, whatever be the 
stage of selfhood or of knowledge of the pupil, whatever be the 
process by which he has reached his present level of develop- 
ment — it should be perfectly evident that future development 
depends for both its direction and intensity upon the present 
emotional and volitional attitudes of the child. Emotional atti- 
tude includes all possible feelings of the child, and these feelings 
are usually projected into objects, events, relationships, etc., 
so that the child is said to fear the dark, love the flowers, etc. 
When this projection, or objectifying, has once taken place, one 
can get at will the feeling by assuming the appropriate motor 
attitude toward the object, event, relationship, etc. This estab- 
lishing of a motor attitude toward objects, events, relationships, 
ideals, institutions, etc., is volitional attitude. 

These terms, emotional attitude and volitional attitude, are 
too broadly generic to describe certain emotional and volitional 
attitudes that are of vital concern to the educative process, and, 
hence, two other terms are used, viz., interest and attention. 

Interest (literally, he is between, or among) was first used 
to describe the physical attitude of one whose mind was, so to 
speak, lost in an object — whose mind seemed to be in the ob- 
ject. Then interest naturally came to be used to describe the 
mental attitude of one who was thus lost in an object. Interest 
is the felt value of a stimulus (be it flower, ideal, institution, 
theory, or what not) for the self that feels it — the felt worth of 

253 



254 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

an object. If one believes that a thing has, inherent in it, the 
power to make his life more satisfactory, he is interested in that 
thing. This is simply saying that the self is originally so con- 
stituted that it seeks certain satisfactions, because of certain 
felt needs. 

Not all these needs are felt with equal clearness, and many 
of them are largely organic, as hunger, thirst, stretching, etc. 
These organic, or physiological, needs are the basis of many of 
the random movements of young children. What has already 
been said of reflex, instinctive, and impulsive movement in 
another connection may be interpreted in terms of need and 
interest. So, too, the so-called stages of mental activity take 
their rise in the felt needs of the child. This felt need may arise 
in the child because of an hereditary, or natural, organization 
of the self," or it may arise from an organization of the self that 
has been brought about through the reaction of the self to some 
stimulus or other. There are,, therefore, two kinds of interest, 
the natural and the acquired. Acquired interest always and of 
necessity rests ultimately upon natural interests. 

The mere process of living, of adjusting one's self to any 
kind of environment whatever, develops interest. But it is a 
well known psychological fact that if a stimulus be repeated 
with equal intensity at intervals, it ceases to be felt, or is felt in 
diminished intensity. One becomes accustomed to the ticking 
of the clock, - to his friend's peculiarity of speech and manner, 
to the hum of the schoolroom, etc., and does not notice them. 
Let them cease, however, or change, and one notices them at 
once. Uniformity of environment tends thus to make one 
unconscious of it, and thus to deaden interest. But people do 
not entirely lose interest in these things as the longing for the 
old-time environment clearly shows. Active interest in an en- 
vironment is thus seen to depend upon those adjustments which 
have a felt value; and the value will be more keenly felt if there 
is enough variety to call out new needs as those already felt are 
satisfied. 



CLASS INTEREST AND ATTENTION 

Habit in adjustment is thus seen to be the point at which 
interest subsides. The organization of self which is effected 
by habit becomes the basis for a new need. This new need 
may be so clearly felt of itself that it sets up a new interest, or 
it may require the suggestion of a teacher or of a social situa- 
tion to bring it to the point of clear consciousness. That is 
very artistic teaching, indeed, in which the pupil, in response 
to the teacher's question, sincerely says/' That is just what I want 
to know." Whenever a pupil really wants to know, he is ready 
to learn, ready to put forth effort to find out, and genuinely to 
develop. When, however, a pupil does not want to know — is 
blase — he may, it is true, be forced to learn, but it is doubtful 
if this forced organization of the self is really serviceable. 

Attention is really a tension (literally, a stretching toward), 
is the motor attitude of adjustment that inevitably arises from 
interest. Attention is also self -direction as when an end, 
whether interesting or not, is chosen and the activity necessary 
for its realization is put forth. 

Attention, then, is simply the adjustment of the self to a 
stimulus either because of an inherent, or because of a self- 
determined, worth in the object. Even the Puritan, whose 
ethical code was, "If a thing is disagreeable and you do not 
wish to do it, you should do it anyhow," had so organized him- 
self that, he really got more satisfaction from doing disagreeable 
things than he would have gotten from doing the agreeable ones. 

There are, then, two kinds of attention, viz., involuntary 
attention — that adjustment of the self to a stimulus which arises 
without any sense of effort; and voluntary attention — which 
is the self-determined adjustment to a stimulus. Great power 
of voluntary attention is usually looked upon as desirable, but 
it is always a derived thing and is based upon those ideas which 
have been acquired by previous acts of attention; and ultimately, 
these ideas go back to those initial ones that have come through 
involuntary attention. Just as random, reflex, instinctive, and 
impulsive movements furnish the basis for, and determine, 




256 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

voluntary movements, so that organization of the self which at 
first arises from natural interest determines the later organiza- 
tion that may be brought about by voluntary attention. 

The mind attends with its ideas ; that is, the present organi- 
zation of the self (the resultant, in large part, of its previous 
activities) determines whether or not the self can adjust itself 
to the present stimulus. Hence, the more one knows about 
any subject or object, the more can he attend to it, provided his 
previous activities have not exhausted the range of (to him) 
possible adjustments; the less one knows about it, the less can 
he find in it. Knowledge is a controllable organization of the 
self, and, hence, generally means that the self shall have func- 
tioned more than once in a particular way. This refunctioning 
in the same way is incipient habit and brings about a controllable 
organization of the self. It is this structural organization of the 
self, whether controllable or not, with which the mind attends. 

Therefore, it is said that, in order to keep attention func- 
tioning, the object must change. With young children this is 
true, for the self of the child functions largely in response to sug- 
gestion. But when there is that organization of the self which 
is called maturity, the self can adjust itself in various ways to 
the same stimulus or object. The change of self adjustment is 
the same in its psychological effect as would be a change in the 
object itself. 

In a deeper sense, the real object for the mind is not the 
external thing at all, but is just this activity of internal adjust- 
ment. As has already been seen, the repetition of an activity 
with the same degree of intensity tends to produce a subsiding 
consciousness — moves toward the unconsciousness of habit as 
its limit. And so, the maintenance of attention, with the max- 
imum of consciousness along with it, demands a change in the 
adjustment of the self. 

What is called reflection is nothing but this process of 
internally initiated and exhaustive self adjustment to a stimulus 
or situation. It is opposed to impulsiveness, which is a sort of 



CLASS INTEREST AND ATTENTION 257 

blind, random, chance adjustment. The reflective person passes 
possible adjustments of the self to the situation in review and 
decides upon their relative worth for the self. This reflective 
process often leaves one in doubt as to the relative worth of 
possible adjustments, and, hence, the reticence or non-activity 
of many reflective persons. And so, while reflectiveness, as a 
quality of mind, is desirable, it must have coupled with it that 
sense of responsibility which does identify the self with a possible 
adjustment as worth while, and then proceeds to action. 

The unity of interest and attention in their relation to the 
work of education should now be clearly before us. It may have 
been inferred that, in outlining the aim and the materials of 
education (Chapters II. and IV.), a fitting of the child to the 
subject matter, or the acceptance of an external criterion of 
value was favored. The contrary is true. The subject matter 
is to be fitted to the needs and capacities of the child; the child 
himself is the criterion. But this must not be interpreted to 
mean either that the present interest of the child should control 
the selection of the subject matter, or that the wrong acts of the 
child should go unnoticed and unpunished. The whole process 
of education implies the influence of a person or thing upon a 
developing mind — influencing it by example, resistance, com- 
pliance, command, suggestion, or question. Hence, all of these 
devices may legitimately be used by the teacher to arouse or to 
form a felt need, or to set in motion that activity which will 
satisfy an existing need. That activity of the child which is 
initiated by an anticipated felt worth is the most educative. 

§ 53. THE RELATION OF ATTENTION TO THE FORMATION OF 
THE SELF. 

The preceding section, together with the analysis of the ways 
in which the mind learns (Chapter V.), enables one to see that 
(1) whenever attention exists some reorganization of the self 
inevitably occurs; (2) whenever organization of the self occurs 
attention accompanies it, If apperception is" the process by 



258 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

which the mind learns more and retention the process by which 
the mind becomes more, 1 attention is the necessary condition of 
progressive apperceptive and retentive organization of the self. 

The formative influence of things to which one does not con- 
sciously attend is great, but such things are accompanied by or 
occur in the medium of involuntary attention, viz., the unchosen, 
responsive adjustment of the self to a stimulus. Such organiza- 
tion of the self occurs through the unconscious imitation of the 
teacher by the pupils, the influence of the decoration of the 
schoolroom, the unconscious growth of ideals of conduct through 
social participation, etc. While this aspect of organization is 
important for the school, the school is essentially a place in 
which the effort is to form pupils by having them consciously 
attend to certain things. 

The momentary, pulse-like character of voluntary atten- 
tion that does not proceed out of interest, demands that the 
school shall be so organized that pupils wish to do what the 
teacher wishes them to do. If, as has already been pointed out, 
interest is necessary to continuity of attention, the maximum of 
educative effort can exist only when the subject matter is so 
organized that the pupils find new needs constantly awakened 
by their efforts to satisfy those which they now feel. 

If Baldwin's view of apperception be accepted, viz., the 
synthesis of mental data into higher forms of unity, it is clear 
that the ease and readiness of this synthesis is dependent upon 
the consciousness-intensity of the data thus synthesized. This 
consciousness-intensity, or vividness, is proportional to the in- 
tensity of attention. Apperception is therefore conditioned by 
attention. An apperceptive act that occurs with a maximum 
of attention is thus retained longer than one that occurs with a 
minimum of attention. People remember their school escapades 
so vividly and their lessons so imperfectly for this reason. And 
this shows that a maximum of attention produces maximum 
retention as well as maximum apperception. 

l Dewey's Psychology, pp. 85 ff. 



CLASS INTEREST AND ATTENTION 259 

Summing up the section: — The effective, permanent organ- 
ization of the self is dependent upon the intensity of the attention 
preceding or accompanying the activities of the self, and the 
intensity of the attention is dependent upon interest. 

§ 54. WHAT CLASS INTEREST DEPENDS UPON. 

Turning now to the problem of class interest, there will be 
but little difficulty in analyzing it out. 

(a) If interest be felt worth, what is taught is evidently one 
element in determining class interest. Pupils in the first grade 
can not answer to the stimulus of the binomial theorem with the 
feeling of interest. Felt worth is wholly subjective, and to 
arouse it the stimulus must connect with an already devel- 
oped organization of the self. Because the memorizing of 
the catechism did not thus connect with the nature of the 
child, it has always been a deadening rather than an educative 
activity. 

Adult society has always felt the need of transmitting to its 
young, its own body of knowledge, skill, and culture; but it has 
often been guilty of trying to force upon children a view of life 
to which there was no answering sense of need — no basis in in- 
terest; and often, too, this foreign view of life has been presented 
from its form side with no effort to acquaint children with its 
content. It is true that children should grow into men and 
women, but it is no more true that they become men and women 
by gaining the vocabulary of adults than it is that a little girl of 
eight in a long skirt is a woman. 

What is taught, then, must answer to a sense of need (native 
or acquired). But it must also awaken new needs so that there 
may be a progressive impulsion to new things. 1 And this pro- 
gressive impulsion should be towards adult interests, attitudes, 
and ideals. The recent changes in the curriculum of the ele- 
mentary school have been in the direction of organizing it in 
such a way that it progressively answers to the shifting capacities 

i Dr. Grant Karr says: "Education is growth into better things." 



260 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

and interests of children and also in the direction of including 
those things which make for genuine socialization. 

(b) Implicit in what has just been said is the truth that in- 
terest also depends largely upon the way in which the things of 
the curriculum are taught. Since every content has its expres- 
sive form, there are two generic methods of teaching, viz., that 
which proceeds from form to content, and that which proceeds 
from content to form. The first of these methods — from form 
to content — relies chiefly upon memory and the associative 
process. The second method — from content to form — relies 
chiefly upon constructive thinking and the associative process. 
The associative process is always necessary to the establishment 
of that permanence of structure which is necessary to any high 
degree of constructive thinking. 

If method be looked at from the point of view of the degree 
of activity of the self-initiated type that is called forth by it, we 
find that there is an active and a passive method of teaching, 
a method that throws the burden of thinking for himself back 
upon the child, and a method that assumes to do this for the 
child, leaving him simply the memorizing of the forms by which 
this thinking is expressed. 

Or, looking at the concept as the final form toward which 
all knowledge should tend, we have an inductive and a deductive 
method of teaching. 

Whatever words are used in describing method, it is evident 
that interest develops the pupil's self -activity and also that self- 
activity develops interest. Interest may and does follow from 
any real activity of the self, but it dies out if a child is urged to 
discover what he can get only by imitation, or to imitate what he 
ought to get by discovery. This is why grammar and history 
taught by the memorizing process soon lose interest. 

There are, as has been seen, as many valid methods of 
teaching as there are valid ways of learning. Some things can 
and should be learned by one process, and some by another. It 
has been seen, too, that there is a difference in the degree of self- 



CLASS INTEREST AND ATTENTION 261 

activity in imitation, discovery, and invention. For pupils in 
the elementary school, imitation is at a maximum when they 
enter and decreases as an interest-exciting activity as advance 
is made through the grades. The reverse is true of discovery 
and invention. Interest, therefore, demands that the method 
of teaching be in harmony with the ascendant way of learning. 
Method, then, is not a foreign or formal way of bringing the 
child and the subject matter together, but is a process by which 
the teacher, in ordering the stimuli that play upon the child, 
conforms to the nature of the child and of the subject matter. 
(c) The personality of the teacher — There is, however, over 
and above method in the sense here used, an element which in- 
fluences the pupil's interest and which arises from the person- 
ality of the teacher. This element is exceedingly difficult to 
analyze and describe because it is so individual and subtle. The 
enthusiasm and sincerity of the teacher, as these are revealed 
in his attitude toward the work of the school and toward the 
pupils, seem, by a process of unconscious suggestion, to become 
elements of the attitude of the pupils. This power of inspiring 
others with one's own attitude is the indefinable secret of great 
teachers and great leaders of men. 

§ 55. UPON WHAT CLASS ATTENTION DEPENDS. 

Having seen that class interest depends upon what is taught, 
how the teaching is done, and the personality of the teacher, the 
things that determine class attention should be considered. 

(a) In light of what has already been said, it is evident that 
class attention depends upon class interest. This class interest 
means, essentially, that each member of the class has an interest 
similar to that of every other member. It is this genuine " com- 
munity of interests" that really makes a class from what would 
otherwise be an aggregation of individuals. 

(b) Then, too, there are certain laws of attention to which 
the teacher's efforts must conform if the attention of the class is 
to be maintained. All sorts of sensory stimuli have a tendency 



262 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

to attract the attention to them and thus to interfere with class 
attention to the thing in hand. There must be sufficient change 
to keep up the attention and yet time enough for each individual 
to think for himself. A too rapid progress means either imita- 
tive or superficial thinking. Then, too, a certain indefinable 
amount of repetition is necessary to the right ease and readiness 
of attention. 

(c) Along with these purely subjective' conditions is the 
objective one of the motor attitude of both teacher and pupils 
which operates by suggestion and by the tone which it imparts 
to the mind. A lazy, slouchy teacher will find his pupils lacking 
in attention. The lounging on desks and chairs, the dragging 
of the feet, the "circular" spine, are physical attitudes that in- 
fluence the emotional attitude of pupils and teacher alike. The 
contrary motor attitudes have, of course, a contrary effect. The 
larger use of motor activity now made in schools is productive of 
a more energetic tone. The use of gymnastics as "dissipators 
of fatigue" is commendable, but over and beyond this is that 
motor attitude of vigor that should key both teacher and pupil 
to the task before them. This motor attitude comes from co- 
operatively wrestling with a problem. 

(d) But, since the teacher is the one who directs the pupils' 
attack upon the problem, who indicates the advance and the 
retreat and summary, and who controls, in a way, the problems 
that shall be attacked, much of the matter of class attention 
depends directly upon the technique of the teacher's questions 
and directions. The value of a direction or a question is meas- 
ured by its effect in arousing the child's thought. Teachers 
should therefore make a study of the effects of questions upon 
the minds of pupils. 1 

(e) And, finally, the class opinion of the teacher has much 
to do with the genuineness of class attention. Some teachers 
who have selected material that is interesting to the class, who 

i The whole of the section on questioning, pp. 151 to 179, has a close relation 
to this topic. 



CLASS INTEREST AND ATTENTION 263 

observe the laws of attention, who insist upon the right motor 
attitudes, and whose questions are skillful find, after all, that 
the attention of the class is spasmodic and uncertain. This re- 
sult may be due to ill health or to defective physical conditions 
of pupils, but is more frequently due to the fact that the pupils 
do not respect the teacher. Respect lies at the basis of all right 
attitudes of pupils to teacher, and pupils do not long respect any- 
thing which is not of true worth. A wholesome, genuine person- 
ality is thus the first requisite of a successful teacher. Having 
this, other things may be added to it ; but lacking it, all skill and 
technique are in vain. 

§ 56. PARTICIPATION THE REAL SECRET OF CLASS INTEREST 
AND ATTENTION. 

One is interested in and attends to that in which he finds 
himself. The degree of self-activity is the measure of interest 
and attention. Activity, not passivity, is the law of mental life, 
and activity means participation in things. Participation im- 
plies a constructive, cooperative activity. In a way, this con- 
structive, cooperative activity is a result of interest and atten- 
tion; but it also produces them. Sometimes interest comes only 
with the doing of an act, and sometimes interest prompts the 
act. With children, and genetically with everybody, interest is 
a resultant of activity. Hence, participation in the work of the 
class — cooperative thought activity — is the condition out of 
which interest arises. 

Any subject may be so taught that the pupils do not partici- 
pate in it in any genuine sense. History, as a mere collection of 
facts to be memorized; arithmetic, as a series of rules to be ap- 
plied; geography, as a mass of facts of location, of government, 
of industry, or of physical principles; grammar, as an organized 
body of truths about our language — in subjects taught thus, 
pupil participation is an impossibility. The belief that knowl- 
edge is the central aim of school education really prevents genuine 
pupil participation in class work. All imitatively acquired 



264 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

knowledge demands a constructive use in order that it become 
one's own. The failure to recognize the greater educative effect 
of an association formed by one's self as compared with an asso- 
ciation formed because of an external copy is, and has ever been, 
a fundamental source of pedagogical error both in the school- 
room and in the home. 

With respect to knowledge already organized by another, 
participation is identical in meaning with discovery and inven- 
tion and self-initiated activity. Participating is re-discovering, 
re-believing, re-inventing, re-living the life of the race. By 
thus giving to the materials of education the highest possible 
reality, one really becomes. And this is but the equivalent 
of a position already taken in this book, viz., that all conscious- 
ness is motor in its origin and it is never complete till it also 
becomes motor. 

§ 57. THE FORMATION OF HABITS OF ATTENTION. 

It is true that any activity of the self tends to repeat itself 
upon the presentation of an equivalent or similar stimulus. This 
tendency is incipient habit. It should now be perfectly clear 
that acts of attention when repeated become habitual, and thus 
the formation of habits of attention is as simple a matter as is 
the formation of motor habits. It is desirable that habits of 
attention to worthy things should be formed so that the child 
shall become self-determined. Habits of attention mean ten- 
dency to see certain things in the world, organization of the self, 
structure of the self, impulsive tendency. 

Habits of attention are formed only by the repetition of 
similar acts of attention. If interest be present, the repetition 
is internally initiated, and the pleasurable element involved in- 
sures sufficient repetition for the formation of clearly defined 
and lasting habits. If interest be lacking, the necessarily exter- 
nally caused repetition lacks in that all-important element of 
personal initiative which gives genuine vitality to mental activity. 
Therefore, whenever children do not genuinely live in school, • 



CLASS INTEREST AND ATTENTION 265 

very few desirable habits of attention can be formed. We may 
paraphrase Portia's declaration about the quality of mercy thus: 
the habit of attention is not strained (forced). 

Habits of attention are formed by the repetition of responses 
to similar stimuli. The habit of observing birds can not be 
formed by simply studying the sparrow and the canary. The 
range of observation must be much wider, and one must see how 
different kinds of birds adapt themselves to their environment, 
and what effects a particular adaptation has on the structure and 
habits of such birds. That is, the range of observation must be 
broad enough to introduce the element of variety. But variety 
must be supplemented by genuine reflection, or thinking. So, 
too, in the formation of the habit of attending to industrial pro- 
cesses, the range of observation and of doing must be broad and 
supplemented by thinking. 

The amount of repetition necessary to the formation of a 
habit of attention is also dependent on the original vividness of 
the experience, and upon the vividness of the memory and imag- 
ination founded upon this original experience. The vividness 
of an experience depends largely upon the place which it occupies 
in a mental series — whether expected or not. If not expected, 
the vividness is proportional, in a rough way, to the intensity of 
the stimulus. If expected, the vividness is proportional to the 
intensity of the expectation — to the intensity of one's feeling and 
groping after it. This is why the setting up of problems for 
children to solve for themselves is such an effective method of 
teaching; and it also shows why passive methods of education 
are such miserable failures when judged by the idea that teach- 
ing is really forming the child's mind. 

The danger of "closed habit," or arrested development, is 
very great in this process of developing habits of attention, and 
can be guarded against only by a constant appeal to the imagina- 
tion. This appeal should be a means of broadening the child's 
imagery, and thus of preparing him for further observation, dis- 
covery, and invention. 



266 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

§ 58. THE DEVELOPMENT OF PERMANENT LINES OF INTEREST. 

If school life is what it should be, the lines of interest awak- 
ened therein will be productive of extra-schoolroom activities. 
The reverse movement is also commendable, viz., interests 
which arise outside of the schoolroom become the motive for 
school work. This dialectic of schoolroom and extra-schoolroom 
activities is what makes genuine living an inspiring reality in 
some schools, and the lack of it makes other schools to be 
"slaughter-houses of the mind." 

The implications of this chapter and, in fact, of the entire 
book, are that it is possible, desirable, and imperative that pupils 
be brought to such a degree of constructive participation in the 
worthy realities of life that they become effective social units as 
regards both the actual and the ideal life of the race. Such a 
realization demands, as has before been implied, a constructive 
contact with generic race interests, activities, and ideals. The 
result of such constructive contact is the establishment of per- 
manent interests — interests that do not fade with the dawn of 
vacation or of commencement, but — which become beacon 
lights to guide the man and the woman in the strenuous years 
that crowd them unrelentingly forward. The love of good litera- 
ture is such an interest. Interests in geographical exploration, 
in great historical epochs and characters, in economic and social 
questions that never become political issues, etc. — such interests 
should become second nature. 

The development of such broad, permanent interests is 
imperative in a Democracy such as ours, for they bring the 
individual who is made into a mere "shred of humanity" 
by our minute division of labor back into sympathetic and 
vital touch with generic human interests, activities, and 
ideals. Such permanent interests as are here discussed will 
make real that sense of "trusteeship of wealth" without 
which the power that wealth bestows becomes a social and 
personal menace, will make that sense of kinship and of 



CLASS INTEREST AND ATTENTION 267 

service which is the central ideal of Christianity the fundamen- 
tal motive of life. 

From this point of view, interest, attention, the teacher, the 
curriculum, the school system, and the ideals of education are 
but means to an end, means which will aid the child in becoming 
a worthy member of society. 1 

i Excellent articles on Interest, are found in De Garmo's "Interest and 
Education,'" pp. 1 — 43; and Dewey's "Interest as Belated to Will," in Second 
Supplement to the Herbart Year Book for 1895. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

The Professional Preparation of the Teacher. 

If the preceding interpretations of the aims, materials, pro- 
cesses, and methods of education be valid, successful teaching is 
a very difficult task. In elementary schools as they are at pres- 
ent organized, a teacher has charge of pupils for a year; or, per- 
chance, if the teacher be exceptionally good and the school 
authorities exceptionally sensible, two or three years. The 
result is that pupils oftentimes lose much because of their in- 
ability to adjust themselves to the "new teacher." Oftentimes, 
too, the difficulty of adjustment is due to the fact that the teacher 
is lacking in the sense of educational perspective. 

A person who knows nothing about making shoes except 
cutting the lining or adjusting the heel, may be a successful 
workman in a shoe factory; but a teacher who knows nothing 
more about education than simply the geography he is to teach, 
will fail, not only in the general conduct of the school, but also 
in teaching the geography effectively. If the great aim of educa- 
tion is to be realized at all, it must be realized through the teach- 
ing and discipline of the school, the home, and the street. He 
who would teach successfully, then, should appreciate the rela- 
tion of what he is doing to the realization of the great aim of 
education. 

§ 59. THE TEACHER SHOULD UNDERSTAND LIFE IN ITS HISTOR- 
ICAL ASPECTS, PRESENT FORMS, AND 
IDEAL TENDENCIES. 

The aim of education, in any social group, is the ideal of 
that group. But each present group is indebted to other present 
and past social groups. Therefore, the teacher, to understand 



PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION 269 

the social level of to-day, must understand life in its historical 
aspects. 

The teacher should understand the great historical move- 
ments of the past — not simply the names of the rulers, the dates 
of their births and deaths — not simply the statistics of the great 
battles for human freedom and advancement. Without in any 
way minimizing the value of an intensive study of historical 
movements, it is certainly true that an appreciation of the broad 
outlines of human development is necessary to an adequate 
realization of what society now is, and, hence, necessary to 
effective teaching. Such an appreciation comes more naturally 
and effectively from reflection upon such subjects as history, the 
evolution of government, anthropology, economics, and ethics, 
than from a study of Hegel's Philosophy of History, or Buckle's 
History of Civilization, for through reflection upon the subjects 
mentioned one forms his own philosophy of life. When this has 
been formed, the individual is in a position to profit by a study 
of Kant, Hegel, Spinoza, Plato, Plotinus, etc. 

When one, through a study of the historical aspects of social 
life, comes to the formulation of a philosophy of social evolution, 
he discovers that the present social level is really dynamic. The 
present forms are not permanent realities, for even the institu- 
tion of marriage is now undergoing change. Therefore, the 
teacher should not only know what social life has been, but also 
what social life is. This demands two things, viz., a wide ac- 
quaintance with men and affairs, and a sane sort of reflective- 
ness, or maturity. Other things being equal, the teacher with 
the widest knowledge of present industrial processes and ex- 
change will be the best teacher of geography. The flippant 
fashion devotee is lacking in that maturity which is essential to 
educative teaching. A university graduate who does not know 
whether potatoes grow on the vines or underground would prob- 
ably make a poor teacher of agriculture for a country school. 

This appreciation of what social life now is prepares one to 
live in the actual social world. But when the child has grown 



270 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

to maturity, society will have advanced. In a sense, then, no 
school can adequately prepare one for all the demands with 
which life will confront him. The thoughts of men, however, 
bridge this span with what are called social ideals. These social 
ideals are what men believe society ought to be. If, then, the 
child can be led to project social ideals, he is thus prepared to 
judge, as his experience progressively widens, of the values of 
the actual social adjustments with which he comes in contact. 

The above analysis reveals the necessity for the teacher's 
acquaintance with the ideal tendencies of society. The teacher 
should, of course, have social ideals of his own, but he should 
also be acquainted with the ideals of others as well. 

In the phrase "an understanding of social life" much more 
is included than is to be taught, and also that indefinable thing 
called ''insight," "sense," "gumption" — the thing that no writ- 
ten examination can test and no set method of teaching in- 
fallibly develop. 

§ 60. THE TEACHER SHOULD UNDERSTAND THE PHYSICAL, IN- 
TELLECTUAL, EMOTIONAL, AND VOLITIONAL 
DEVELOPMENT OF THE CHILD. 

This understanding of social reality in the sense above out- 
lined is only one phase of the teacher's preparation. It is by 
his progressive participation in social reality that the child is 
educated. The teacher, then, should understand the child. 
Child is ambiguous, for it may mean the non-existent average 
child or a particular child. Many children have been studied 
by trained observers, and a schematic outline of child develop- 
ment has been formulated. With this general outline of child 
development every teacher should be familiar. 

•There is, however, a serious danger in this connection, viz., 
the teacher is apt to regard every child whose development does 
not conform to this outline as abnormal, and it is a great mis- 
fortune to a child to be regarded by his teacher as abnormal. 
Dentists and physicians have formulated an outline of the order 



PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION 271 

of child dentition, but a child's teeth may appear in a different 
order and there be no real cause for alarm. Conscious imitation 
usually begins in the seventh month of a child's life, and yet the 
non-appearance of it at that time may result in greater original- 
ity and inventiveness in the child. 

The general theory of child development is, notwithstand- 
ing its dangers, a valuable basis for the study of individual chil- 
dren. It is an understanding of the development of the indi- 
vidual child that is of greatest value to the teacher, and each 
child has its own order of development. 

The physical development of the child is of first concern, 
as upon it all other development depends. To take the child as 
he is and develop him into what he ought to be physically, re- 
quires a knowledge of muscles and of exercises suited to their 
symmetrical development. The matters of diet, of exercise, of 
fatigue, and of rest are as necessary to successful teaching as is 
a knowledge of the revolutionary period to the teacher of United 
States history. 

The intellectual development of the child, in its broad out- 
lines, has already been sketched. 1 The interpretation of any 
particular child's intellectual development in light of any out- 
line is subject to error, but such outlines are valuable as furnish- 
ing a basis of study and interpretation. The teacher needs to 
know how the child's intellectual activity develops from the 
uncertain perceptual response to chance stimuli, to reflective 
systematization. 

Along with intellectual development, there inevitably goes 
emotional and volitional development. Here, again, the order 
of development is erratic. This erratic character is partly due 
to the impulsiveness and the unforeseen tendencies that inevitably 
arise from experience. In a previous chapter 2 under the heading 
"stages of selfhood in developing children" the chief emotional 
and volitional stages, as these appear in children of elementary 

1 Chapters V., VI., XL, and XII. 

2 Chapter VI., pp. 94—102. 



272 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

school age, were imperfectly sketched. The analysis of these 
stages into more minute stages is desirable for the teacher. 

The developing child, lacking as he is in inhibitive control, 
experiences the extremes of emotion. There is, therefore, great 
difficulty in developing a serviceable disposition, i.e., a generic 
feeling and volitional attitude toward the whole range of one's 
experiences. The "mood of the child" is so vital a factor in his 
education that teachers should be as skilled in dealing with 
moods as with subject matter. 

The understanding of the child which is here urged is 
best described as genetic psychology supplemented by ob- 
servation of particular children. The value of this lies in 
the ability it gives one to bring the developing child into 
such relations with social life and knowledge that the child 
becomes socialized. 

§61. THE TEACHER SHOULD, BY PRACTICE UNDER GUIDANCE, 
BECOME SKILLED IN THE TECHNIQUE OF USING THE 
MATERIALS OF EDUCATION TO BRING ABOUT 
THE MAXIMUM SOCIAL DEVELOP- 
MENT OF THE CHILD. 

In previous chapters the materials of education have been 
analyzed to show their essential social and socializing character, 
and the various methods of learning were also analyzed. The 
problem, then, for the teacher, is the presentation of the material 
in such a way as to bring about the maximum socialization of the 
child. This problem is simplified if the teacher plans his work 
in advance. To plan it successfully, he must organize the sub- 
ject matter into a series of related problems, and thus make the 
subject matter his own. 

In the actual teaching, the beginning teacher is likely to 
make many errors. These errors should be made "stepping 
stones to higher things." To this end, guidance should be sug- 
gestive rather than prescriptive ; it should suggest how the teacher 
may find out for himself rather than give explicit directions as 



PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION 273 

to procedure. In short, the guidance should be of such a char- 
acter that the beginning teacher becomes self-directive as soon 
as possible. 

The criticism should be a calm discussion of the relation of 
the teacher's plan to what he actually did in the class, and of the 
relation of what was done to the child's actual growth in knowl- 
edge and in power. Presumably the teacher knows what pur- 
pose he had in mind and the steps by which he sought to realize 
this purpose. If his plan was given up, there must have been a 
reason for it. If the steps were not followed as they were out- 
lined, there must have been valid reasons for changing them. If 
the steps were followed, were they of such a character as to realize 
the purpose ? In short, was the fault in the plan or in the execu- 
tion of the plan? Then, too, the excellent things should be 
considered. 

The criticism should not degenerate either into a scolding 
or into a flattering of the teacher. The plain truth about the 
worth of the effort should be equally prized by the beginning 
teacher and by the critic, and the relations between these two 
persons should be that between an apprentice and a master work- 
man, or that between pupil and teacher. 

In most of our country schools, the criticism is mere per- 
functory and periodic visitation. If the teacher is really pre- 
pared for his work and anxious to succeed, he will soon work 
himself into a better position. Relatively few teachers, however, 
who begin their work in country schools, are prepared for the 
work of teaching. They "assign lessons," "hear lessons," and 
keep the children from destroying property and from fighting. 
The pupils in such schools usually learn and develop by accident. 

In small village schools, the matter of supervision is little 
better than in country schools. The principal teaches the more 
advanced pupils and occasionally gets into the other rooms to 
see an exercise. His own teaching work is so arduous that he 
can do little more than prepare a course of study and hold occas- 
ional teachers' meetings at which matters of general interest are 



274 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

discussed. The teacher's problem, however, is simplified be- 
cause he has fewer grades to teach. 

As soon as a community is large enough to support a non- 
teaching superintendent, business and executive matters relating 
to the school have so multiplied that he has no time for super- 
vision of the effective sort. Special teachers of music, drawing, 
gymnastics, manual training, etc., are employed. These special 
teachers are of two types, viz., those who actually teach, and 
those who supervise. To this supervising body must be added 
the influence of the grade and general teachers' meetings that 
are directed by the superintendent. 

This analysis shows clearly that some preparation for teach- 
ing before one actually begins the work is necessary, or else the 
development of skill in the process is left to blind and fatal 
experience. 

This blind and fatal opportunity to become skilled in teach- 
ing is supplemented in some schools by cadetting. This cadet- 
ting may be simply an opportunity to assist in the care of an 
overcrowded room, or an opportunity to teach under effective 
supervision. Often the cadetting is supplemented by a course 
of study in psychology and educational history. This combina- 
tion makes it really possible for one to grow into teaching power 
under reasonable conditions. The objection to it, however, is 
that the breadth of knowledge of those who do the cadetting is 
usually that of the city high school, and is not broadened during 
the training except along professional lines. 

A further elaboration of the plan just discussed results in 
the city training school, which varies all the way from the barest 
expansion of the cadetting plan to a plan akin to that of the best 
state normal schools. 

The normal school supplements the obvious defect of the 
cadetting system. It aims to extend the prospective teacher's 
knowledge and to give him insight into the materials used in 
elementary education. Along with this line of work, there is a 
study of educational ideals and conditions of the past and present, 



PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION 275 

psychology, and as effective teaching under guidance and crit- 
icism as is deemed possible under existing conditions. 

Schools of education, under various designations, are being 
formed in connection with our leading universities. These uni- 
versity schools do not ordinarily attempt the intensive study of 
the materials of elementary education. This leaves for them 
the study of the various phases of the theory of education, educa- 
tional history, research, and experiment, and whatever actual 
teaching under guidance and criticism is deemed expedient. 

There is, despite these various opportunities for gaining 
skill in teaching under guidance and criticism, a host of ineffi- 
cient teachers in the schools of our country. The fundamental 
cause of their presence is the state of the social consciousness 
regarding education. This apathy is disappearing rapidly with 
the spread of modern means of communicating ideas and with 
rapidly increasing wealth. The doom of inefficiency in the 
schools is sealed, and nothing short of a retrograde movement 
toward savagery can stop the present movement towards the 
improvement of the character of the public schools. 

§ 62. THE TEACHER SHOULD APPROACH HIS TASK WITH A FULL 

CONSCIOUSNESS OF ITS SIGNIFICANCE AND WITH A 

DESIRE TO SERVE THAT " OTHERS MAY HAVE 

LIFE AND HAVE IT MORE ABUNDANTLY." 

If the teacher has an understanding of social reality and of 
developing children, and has acquired the skill already dis- 
cussed, he can approach his task with a full consciousness of its 
significance to the individual children, to the homes from which 
they come, and to society. This consciousness of the signifi- 
cance of the work of elementary school education makes teach- 
ing a pleasure, gives a touch of the dignity of the educative 
process to the daily work of the teacher, and thus destroys that 
sense of drudgery which was once almost epidemic among school 
teachers — it raises teaching from the hod-carrier's level to that 
of the architect, at least. 



276 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

But beyond this appreciation of the significance of the edu- 
cative process is the question of the teacher's motivation. One 
may throw stones into a placid pond and know that the ripples 
reach the distant shore, raise the temperature of the surface 
water and the adjacent land, assist in changing the form of the 
granite boulders on the pond's edge, etc. Consciousness of the 
significance of the far-reaching consequences of one's acts is, 
after all, a barren thing, even for the teacher. The question, 
Why does one, as a teacher, seek to influence his pupils ? demands 
an answer. Teachers must live, and the salary is important; 
but if one teaches for the salary alone, it is a poor and sorry busi- 
ness. But teaching gives one an enviable position in the com- 
munity, social prestige, influence, etc. This is true: but if this 
be one's ultimate motive, he thrusts himself into the lives of boys 
and girls that he may achieve social distinction for himself. 

Civilization, despite unbelief and carping criticism, is essen- 
tially Christian. Social institutions are based on the notion 
of social service. One must lose his life in service before he 
can really find it. The Master said that he came, "that ye 
might have life, and have it more abundantly." This same 
spirit should be the fundamental desire of the teacher. No 
particular denominational alliance of the individual is necessary, 
but if one has not, fundamentally, in his view of life, this desire 
to live in such a way that the world may be better for his having 
lived — this desire to help forward the life of the race to higher 
and better levels — his place in the world is not that of a teacher. 



CHAPTER XV. 

A Discussion of the Summarized Theses Upon Which the 

Arguments and Conclusions of This Book 

are Based. 

In order to condense into a brief statement the fundamental 
ideas advanced in this book, theses that are felt to summarize 
these ideas have been formulated. 

1. Education is inevitable. 

One can not escape experience. One chooses some exper- 
iences and others are forced upon him. So long as one re- 
sponds, either voluntarily or involuntarily, to stimuli, he is 
changed through his response. Even in the case of established 
habit, repetition renders the connection between the successive 
parts of the action more permanent. The soul is more like the 
sea that is never fully at rest than it is like the immobile rock. 
This incessant change in the structure and organization of the 
self is, considered simply as a process and having no relation 
to an end, education. 

2. Education ought to be a progressive socialization by 
participation. 

Experience always implies a sequence of mental activities 
and this sequence would, in the development of the child, 
naturally follow the order of the stimuli that happen to come 
to him. Just as soon as a child has experiences his education 
begins. The child's parents, however, wish him to become an 
acceptable member of the family, and so, with almost infinite 
patience and love, they set about teaching him. That is, the 
parents endeavor to control the stimuli that shall play upon the 

277 



278 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

child. The parents also share in the educational ideal of the 
social group to which they belong, in the ideal of their country, 
and in the ideal of the race. In consequence of this educational 
consciousness in the parents, the child is sent to the school which 
has been organized by just such an educational consciousness 
as that which the child's parents now have. 1 

It is by participation, fundamentally, that the child becomes 
genuinely social. By doing as others do the child gets the pri- 
mary basis for feeling as others feel, thinking as others think, 
acting as others act. Many adult social activities, however, are 
so complex that the child can not perform them, and there is, 
and must be, a reversion to simpler activities and processes. 
These simpler social activities and processes are the ones fol- 
lowed by our remote ancestors, by Indians, savages, and the 
pioneers. The child's interest in primitive social adjustments 
may be due either to racial inheritance or to their suitability to 
his particular level of attainment, or to a combination of these 
two things in varying degrees. 

But, from whatever source the child's interest may spring, 
there is thus afforded a basis for genuine development, for pro- 
gress from simpler social adjustments to more complex ones. 
The progress thus made, provided it be toward the social adjust- 
ments now revered, is what is meant by progressive socializa- 
tion. As civilization becomes more and more complex, that is, 
as more and more difficult adjustments are required of the indi- 
vidual, the period of real infancy lengthens, the advent of maturity 
comes at twenty-eight or thirty rather than at twenty-one, and 
the period of school education is lengthened. At best, the child 
can get only certain social adjustments that are typical and 
vicarious. The broader the range of these typical adjustments, 
the better for the individual and for the society in which his 
lot is cast. The narrower the range of this typical racial adjust- 
ment, the narrower is the individual. 

i Compulsory school attendance laws are for those parents who do not 
have the educational consciousness here mentioned or who would deny it for 
the economic gain that would result from the child's labor. 



DISCUSSION 279 

3. This progressive socialization should be both actual 

and ideal. 
Progressive socialization by participation, which is here 
set up as the rational aim of all education, should result in two 
things, viz., actual social efficiency and ideal social efficiency. 
As a result of the educative process the individual should have 
the power and the disposition to cooperate with others in social 
life. Actual social efficiency includes more than industry, 
honesty, and the discharge of political functions. The actual 
and the ideal are so interwoven that no clear line of demarcation 
between them can be drawn. The ideal is, in a way, what the 
actual would become if it were harmonious and universal. The 
individual should be sensitive to these ideal tendencies, willing 
to conserve them, and devoted to making them to be actual. In 
short, the individual should unflinchingly and honestly perform 
his part of the world's work, and strenuously endeavor to make 
the world better for his having lived in it. One can not better 
state this thought than to quote from President Hyde: — "One's 
duty is the realization of his capacities and powers in harmony 
with each other and in proportion to their true worth as elements 
in a complete individual and social life." 1 

4. The mind learns, or becomes by its own activity. 

Experience, however, is not wholly a matter of an objective 
environment made up of copy, stimulation, and ideals, for the 
response of the mind is as important and necessary as is the 
stimulation itself. The response of the mind is what is meant 
by "its own activity." Self -activity, as used throughout the 
preceding pages, is not the causa sui of speculative philosophy, 
is not a self that acts unconditioned. 

The self, by its reaction to a stimulus, becomes different, 
other, more of a self. Experience is taken up into the self and 
by this process the self grows and develops. This growth and 
development is really organization. Experience is not added 

1 Practical Ethics, p. 179. 



280 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

to the self — it is made one with the already organized self, thus 
producing a new self with every experience. 

The extent to which the organized self is involved in the 
response is the measure of the self -activity implied in the experi- 
ence. "Passive states of mind" are really mental activities in 
which the organized self functions in a minimal way, while 
active states are those mental activities in which the organized 
self functions in a maximum way. The relation between body 
and mind is such that bodily activity may occur with a minimum 
of consciousness. All methods of teaching that have the estab- 
lishment of habit as their aim involve this possibility of mechan- 
ical response in a high degree. The danger in all such mech- 
anical work is that the organized self shall cease to function 
in the response. 

There is, however, a clear value of this mechanical element 
in education. The value consists in what Rosenkranz calls 
"the re-inf or cement of the dynamic by the mechanical." It 
is by this mechanical element, this organization of brain habits 
and brain tendencies, that one's past experiences can be brought 
to bear upon present ones. The truth of this position and its 
far-reaching consequences in education do not constitute any 
valid grounds for making method, at any stage of the child's 
development, predominatingly mechanical. 1 Control, power to 
profit by past failures and successes, ability to form syntheses 
of wider reach and value, depend on this mechanical basis. 
But in and of itself, without the mental equivalents back of it, 
mechanical power is meaningless. The true place of the me- 
chanical element in education, is, as Rosenkranz says, "the 
re-inforcement of the dynamic." 

If what has been said of the development of the self be true, 
it follows that education is a process of infolding as well as a 
process of unfolding. Experience integrates with the self and 
thus infolds a new element into the self. The mere effort to 
express one's meaning necessarily implies that a new sense of 

i Hall's Adolescence, preface, p. xii. 



DISCUSSION 281 

meaning arises (except in cases where the expression is purely 
mechanical). The so-called forms of expression are as truly 
forms of impression. "We learn to do, to think, and to feel by 
doing" is only another way of saying that the mind learns by 
its own activity. 

5. The various stages, or degrees, of mental activity may be 
stated as (a) involuntary experience, imitation, discovery, inven- 
tion, self-activity; (b) as image and conceptual thinking; or (c) 
as primary and derived activities. 

Taking the whole range of mental activity, it may be classi- 
fied in various ways. 

(a) In Chapter V. mental activities were classified into 
involuntary, conscious imitation, discovery, invention, and self- 
activity. This classification is based on the extent to which the 
organized self functions in the experience. It has been seen, 
too, that the greater the extent to which the self functions in an 
experience, the higher is the educative efficiency of the experience. 
Therefore, that method of schoolroom procedure which con- 
stantly incites the child to re-discover and to re-invent his racial 
inheritance is the most educative. The one exception to this 
fundamental principle is found in gaining control of conven- 
tionalized modes of behavior. 

(b) This same matter may also be expressed as image and 
conceptual thinking. Mental activity is, genetically considered, 
the response of the mind to a sensory excitation. The data 
thus obtained are elaborated by the mind into more and more 
inclusive activities which become more and more significant as 
the organized structure of the self enters into them in a less 
sensuous way. This inclusive significance is the ideal element, 
the element furnished by the mind as it has been organized by 
its experiences. 

The image has more of the motor tendency in it, and hence, 
has a keener emotional coloring than has the concept. The 
crude love of pleasure in young children is thus seen to be due, 
in part, to the limited character of their experiences. With 



282 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

the growth of the child's mind in conceptual power, his emotions 
also develop. With the growth of the power to interpret the 
present in terms of its essentials, there grows up in the child 
the power and the disposition to plan for the future. Gradually, 
as his mind performs these activities of wider and more inclusive 
reach, the child becomes mature, gets a sane, impersonal view 
of the meaning of life, forms a philosophy of life. 

So far as one can derive a method of schoolroom procedure 
from this description of the character of developing experience, 
it is this: — The teacher should, as the child's developing experi- 
ence warrants, stimulate him to the formation of syntheses of 
wider and wider reach. 

(c) The growth of the mind from its primitive bondage 
to the senses to a relative freedom may also be described by the 
phrases "primary experience, and derived experience. Primary 
experiences are those basal ones that come because of one's 
immediate contact with the material world, whether he choose 
this contact or whether it is forced upon him. The data thus 
derived are recombined into new wholes, are broken up in vari- 
ous ways and then recombined, or connected with present stimu- 
lations of various kinds. 

The difficulty of drawing any significant distinction between 
these two kinds of experience, and the importance of both kinds 
at every stage of mental development, render it impossible to 
formulate any method of schoolroom procedure in accordance 
therewith. 

To summarize : — In whatever terms one describes the essen- 
tial character of the various degrees of mental activity, it is 
evident that the teacher should stimulate the child to wider and 
higher and more ideal activities. 

6. The school should be so organized that the child thinks 
for himself and thus re-creates his race inheritance. 

The school is primarily a social institution having as its 
central aim the socialization of children. The child becomes 
socialized by participation in social situations, he transforms 



DISCUSSION 283 

himself by building up within himself a world of thoughts, 
feelings, and attitudes that are essentially like those of his fel- 
lows. By doing as others do, by thinking as others think, the 
child becomes as others are. 

This race inheritance is the birthright of every child, but 
he can "come into it" only by re-creating it for himself. A part 
of it must be re-created by conscious imitation, another part by 
discovery and invention, and still another part by self-activity 
and reflection. 

The school is by no means the exclusive agency for the 
socialization of the child, but it is a specially organized agency. 
As such, it can never measure up to the ideal of which it is an 
exponent by setting up the acquisition of a body of knowledge 
or the development of industrial and technical skill as its dis- 
tinctive aim. Knowledge and skill there must be, but these 
things have value only as they are matrixed in social life — ma- 
trixed in such a way that they spring out of a sense of need and 
plunge forward into concrete social deeds. The child is not 
conscious of the significance of his education, but the school 
should be so organized that he progressively develops this appre- 
ciation. 

The sense of what life is and of what life means comes only 
as a resultant of concrete and complete living. Concrete and 
complete living means the re-construction and re-creation of the 
content of social life. The school, then, should be so organized 
that the child progressively re-creates his race inheritance. 

7. The scope of the school should be such that, supple- 
mented as it is by extra-schoolroom experiences, the child builds 
up a sane view of life and develops an ethical attitude toward 
the actual and toward the ideal. 

The scope of the school is variable because other social 
institutions are variable in the opportunity they offer, from 
generation to generation, for the genuine socialization of the 
child. Within the past fifty years there has been a great shift- 
ing, of social functions because of the marvelous industrial 



284 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

transformations which inventions have wrought. The central- 
ization of population has rendered acquaintance with funda- 
mental forms of adjustment to nature and of domestic manu- 
facture impossible for children in many homes. These basal 
things should not be left out of the child's life. Whether it be 
the best plan or not, the school is the institution upon which 
devolves the function of supplying this fundamental socializa- 
tion. Therefore, the spirit of the school should be that of the 
ideal home. Whatever the expanding and developing life of 
the child needs for its genuine socialization, is what civilization 
owes to every child that is born into it. And if this debt is not 
discharged by any other social institution, it is the plain duty of 
the school, so far as social consciousness permits it, to pay this 
debt with interest. The civilization that can satisfy itself with 
efforts at reformation alone, is covered with all those crimes that 
might have been prevented by rightly directed efforts at for- 
mation. 

A sane view of life can come into being only as an out- 
growth of a wide enough range of actual experience to acquaint 
one with the typical and essential human interests, activities, 
modes of behavior, and ideals. A narrow and highly artificial 
and conventionalized life for children produces shallowness and 
a lack of genuine social sanity. 

The sort of sanity here implied is the only valid basis for 
the development of a genuinely ethical attitude. An ethical 
attitude is not an abstract, sorrowful view of one's duty to his 
fellows, but is rather a joyous guidance of conduct with refer- 
ence to the best which one knows — it is a progressive growth 
into those views of permanent value which the loving thought 
of mankind has wrought out. Each person must work out for 
himself this spiritual phase of ethical attitude. One can work 
it out, however, only on the basis of a concrete acquaintance 
with it. Conduct is the external manifestation of one's sense 
of himself-as-related-to-others. The first sense of self-as- 
related-to-others comes from imitation, and is refined and uni- 



DISCUSSION 285 

versalized by reflection upon the ultimate value of certain 
forms of behavior. 

For one to grow up to the level of present social values is a 
great thing. For one to struggle for the attainment of a higher 
level for himself and others — this is the "greatest thing in the 
world." And this "greatest thing in the world" is the raison 
d'etre of all the other things, it is "the last, for which the first 
was made." To get on in life is worth while only as it leads to 
helping life forward. 

If one reflects at all deeply, he will discover that all that 
he is, other than "an infant mewling and puking in its mother's 
arms," he has become through the ministrations of others; and 
he will feel that the least he owes humanity is a life of service. 
This service is, essentially, shaping one's life in accordance with 
the ideal. 

8. The problem is the means, var excellence, for rightly 
conditioning the child. 

How to bring out progressively this attitude of service is the 
great problem of all method, for one may "have all knowledges" 
and be "as sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal." The atti- 
tude of service can come only through the activity of service. 

The problem, which consists of certain relations given and 
certain relations required, which can be ascertained from those 
given, is the best means for rightly conditioning the child. 
Problems having no social reference whatever could be formed 
and the solution of these might develop power apart from serv- 
iceable attitude. But if the problems are matrixed in social 
experiences, as has been urged in the preceding pages, the power 
developed is inseparable from the attitude. The possibility of 
the development of such an attitude along with power is the im- 
plicit strength of all demands that the child should really live 
in school. 1 

l Contrast the above with the following from Hall's Adolescence, preface, 
pp. xi. and xii. : 

"We should transplant the human sapling, I concede reluctantly, as early 
as eight, hut not before, to the schoolhouse with its imperfect lighting, venti- 
lation, temperature." "To many, if not most, of the influences here 
(in the school) there can be at first but little inner response." 



286 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

The emphasis may be varied a little by saying that the great 
outcome of education is, after all, not knowledge, but serviceable 
attitude. Surely initiative, self-reliance, and originality can not 
be fostered and developed by a method that prescribes absolutely 
the activity of the child's mind. Nor can teachers with any 
reasonableness expect that, some fine day after all their dull and 
unsocial teaching is done, and the child has "graduated in new 
clothes," he will suddenly metamorphose himself into a being 
capable of participation in a Democracy. If the great aim of 
education is to be realized at all, it must be realized progres- 
sively in the concrete acts of the child's experience both in and 
out of the schoolroom. This conclusion means that both the 
materials and method of education ought to be in harmony with 
the aim. 

9. The aim and the pivotal question are problems for the 
child to solve. 

The teacher can realize this ideal in his work only by bring- 
ing the materials of education to the attention of the children 
in such a way that a problem arises in their minds in consequence. 
These concrete problems, which should be framed usually by 
the children themselves, are called aims. In the working out 
of these aims, sub-topics, or pivotal questions arise. These 
pivotal questions phrase the organic aspects of the material that 
is being studied, and are the means by which the aim is reached. 1 

10. The materials of instruction should be organized into 
units, or topics, which, when worked out as a series of problems, 
give the materials usually included in such subjects as geography, 
history, drawing, spelling, composition, etc. 

The organic aspects of the material studied are so vital 
that, if they be given opportunity to control, they will practically 
organize the material into a series of topics, or units of study 
which, taken collectively, form the separate subjects of the curric- 
ulum. This order of topics may not be the order of existing 

l This matter has been so fully treated in the chapters on The Recitation, 
that further comment is unnecessary. 



DISCUSSION 287 

textbooks, but it will be far more significant to the children. 
The order of topics would probably not be the same in any two 
schools, nor would the same topics probably be included. So 
long, however, as there is real growth of power and serviceable- 
ness, a certain equivalence in elementary education must be 
conceded as the elective principle concedes it in higher education. 
The course of study is not merely so much knowledge to be 
" administered" to children in uniform doses, but is rather a 
varying opportunity for constructive growth for each child. 

11. The teacher should develop a sense of need in the child, 
and not rely wholly upon already established interests. 

The positions here defended do not mean that the capri- 
ciousness of the child should be allowed to ruin this fine oppor- 
tunity for growth. Interest is the felt worth of an object for 
the self that feels the worth. Essentially, it is the conceived 
relation of the object to the self that leads to interest. The 
teacher can, then, bring worthy objects into such relations to 
children that they conceive these objects as having worth. 

This does not mean that all medicine should be sugar- 
coated (although if this does not detract from the remedial 
properties of the medicine I can see no reason why one should 
object to the coating), or the awakening of factitious interests. 
It does mean, however, that the teacher is able to arouse desire, 
sense of need, interest in the child, by influencing the direction 
of his attention through bringing certain stimuli to bear upon 
him in a definite way. This is the privilege and the duty of the 
teacher. If this be not done, the one who is presumably in 
charge of the immature ones is not a teacher. 

The sense of need, desire, or interest thus awakened by the 
activity of the teacher should progressively be in line with those 
interests which will enable the child to participate more and 
more adequately in the actual and ideal life of the race. 

12. Since all consciousness tends to be motor in its conse- 
quences, and since the motor realization of an idea integrates 
it as an element of character, all forms of expressive and con- 



288 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 

structive experience should be fostered by the school. 

This proposition simply means that the primary basis of all 
higher mental activities is found in reactive experience, and con- 
structive motor experience, as this is distinguished from those 
restricted forms of reaction which constitute conventionalized 
symbols. Therefore, education should utilize this large, free 
motor activity as the basal thing. The school should not pre- 
suppose this basal motor experience when it does not exist. It 
has been conclusively shown that as civilization becomes more 
complex the homes supply less of this basal motor experience 
than they did in former times, and it seems more sensible to 
reconstruct our schools than to bemoan the irretrievable change 
in social conditions. 

13. To be interestedly busy in doing worthy things is the 
best kind of discipline. 

It has been shown that the child's conduct both reveals and 
forms his attitude toward things. Genetically considered, con- 
duct must form attitude before it can reveal it. Therefore, to be 
interestedly busy in doing worthy things is the best kind of disci- 
pline. These worthy things must have a felt worth for the child. 

14. When conduct springs from selfishness or meanness, 
negation by substitution is the best mode of dealing with it, but 
corporal punishment is a last resort. 

One must not suppose, however, that the capriciousness, 
arbitrariness, and anti-social feelings of children can be wholly 
eliminated by any organization of the school. Selfishness and 
sometimes meanness appear. The most sensible treatment for 
such cases is inhibition by substitution. If the teacher can 
influence the child to inhibit the objectionable response by sub- 
stituting a commendable one for it, there is no valid reason for 
treating the offense in a more heroic way. Very often teachers 
yield to the desire to vindicate themselves by a display of their 
authority. It is the welfare of the child, however, and not the 
personal feelings of the teacher that should be considered. 

Yet it is better for the child that he should suffer the pain of 



DISCUSSION 289 

corporal punishment and even the disgrace of being whipped in 
the presence of his peers than that he should persist in acts of 
selfishness and meanness. All punishment is a corrective, pain 
voluntarily inflicted by one responsible for the growth of another 
with the idea of ?-e-forming a malformed sense of self. 

15. Education is such a complex thing that the school 
becomes what it should be only when all the forces involved 
work together harmoniously and effectively. 

To quote the opening sentence of this book: — "Education, 
in one aspect or another, touches every human interest, and is 
the most universal concern of mankind." It is, therefore, a 
very complex thing both because of its reach and because of the 
multitude of things that influence it. One can grasp it only by 
thinking of its sweep and by picturing it negatively. It is the 
effort of a present society to perpetuate itself through industry, 
science, art, and institutions. Therefore, to the extent that all 
the factors in the control of this process have a sense of its mean- 
ing and worth, to that extent does the greatest efficiency of the 
process become a possibility. When to this insight into the 
meaning and worth of education there is added the desire to 
help life forward in the spirit of the Master, this possibility of 
education becomes a reality in education. 



APPENDIX 

PART I. 

An Analytical Summary. 

This summary of the book in outline form is introduced to af- 
ford a means of review for students who work alone, and for the bene- 
fit of those who wish to get the whole thought of the book in a few 
pages. The separate sentences will, in many cases, furnish excellent 
material for an effort to present the argument underlying them in 
either an oral or written form. After one has thus formulated his 
thought, he should compare it with the text for verification. The 
student will in this way get a clearer grasp of the matter than he 
possibly could by any amount of reading and re-reading. 

Chapter I. Introductory. Pp. 11-17. 

Skill is always an evidence that one has been educated — Edu- 
cation is the most universal concern of mankind because (1) it touches 
every phase of human life, and (2) continues throughout one's life — 
Education has been described as oihering, building a world, removing 
a tension between the ideal and the real — Society establishes schools 
for the realization of social ends — The fundamental problem of the 
school is, What materials of education and what methods of procedure 
are most efficient in realizing the aim of education — If specialists 
choose the materials and prescribe the methods, the teacher is merely 
an executive — The teacher should be an artist — To reach his highest 
efficiency the teacher must have a "motor knowledge" of psychology 
and of the aims of education. 

Chapter II. The Aim of Education and the Function of the 
School. Pp. 18-32. 

The sequence and the character of one's mental activities are 
dependent upon the sequence and the character of his educative ex- 
periences. 

§ 1. (pp. 19-21.) The aim of education is the same as the con- 
scious aim of society — All social groups have ends which they strive 
to realize — Each person derives his educational ideal from his mani- 
fold social relations — This ideal is pervasive and inclusive, but changes 
with progress. 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 291 

§ 2. (pp. 21-22.) The aim of education has a formal, static charac- 
ter — Each group strives to perpetuate itself socially as well as phy- 
sically — Hence, the young must be taught to perform those functions 
which adults now perform — These functions are actual and ideal— 
To have the young become what adults in the group are is a formal 
aim because what this implies is not set forth. 

§ 3. (pp. 22-24.) The aim has a spiritual, dynamic character — 
The ideal of what one should be and do changes as the group develops 
— The meaning which a social group puts - into the words expressing 
its ideal is the spiritual element of the aim of education — Social groups 
are subject to habit, especially with respect to organized institutions 
— There are many evidences, however, that there is growth in the 
educational ideal. 

§ 4. (pp. 24-26.) The aim is adequate participation in social 
life — The life of the race is actual and ideal — To participate adequate- 
ly in social life one must be able to understand and use language; 
must have a broad enough first-hand acquaintance with the great 
types of human activity to be genuinely sympathetic; must appre- 
ciate ideals — As society becomes complex and interdependence 
grows, group ideals give way to racial ideals; and racial ideals, in 
turn, to ideals that include all mankind. 

§ 5. (pp. 26-29.) How participation is possible — (a) — Since each 
group has some notion of its relation to nature, and since life is main- 
tained, primarily, by getting into certain relations with natural things, 
each child must gain a certain control over natural things — A wide 
acquaintance with typical forms of human control of nature is valua- 
ble — Occupations are especially valuable in elementary education — 
(b) — The group has a mental and social life into which the child must 
grow — Passive and active controls of symbolism are implied in this 
growth — From content to symbol is a characteristic of the new edu- 
cation — (c) — The child^can grow into institutional life only by parti- 
cipating in it. 

§ 6. (pp. 30-32.) Many of the things necessary to the socialization 
of the child, especially symbols, can be taught to many at once — Hu- 
manitarian motives lie back of the founding of nearly all schools — 
Schools are sometimes good financial investments — The public school 
grows in favor as social consciousness broadens — Schools ought to 
supply that which the expanding life of the child needs for its genu- 
ine socialization 

§ 7. (p. 32.) The real social character of the public school — The 
great social aims are conservation and advancement — Adequate so- 



292 APPENDIX — ANALYTICAL STUDY 

cialization is the debt society owes each child — The public school is 
an institution having socialization as its supreme task. 

Chapter III. The Meaning of Education. Pp. 33-43. 

The meaning of education is found in the concrete activities 
which make up the process of education — Different meanings arise 
from looking at the process in different ways — There is a value in 
studying these differences. 

§ 8. (pp. 33-35.) Education as a process of organizing acquired 
habits of conduct and tendencies to behavior — Habit has a large 
place in human life — Habit is largely physiological — Mental habit 
means mental organization, and this, in turn, is the self — If given a 
physiological interpretation merely, this description is inadequate 
— It also fails to set up an end toward which the 'process moves. 

§ 9. (pp. 35-36.) Education as a process of grafting serviceable 
reactions upon natural tendencies — Natural tendencies are the sine 
qua non of learning — Only the first things are learned by grafting. 

§ 10. (pp. 36-37.) Education as a process of widening the gap 
between impression and expression by inhibition — The action of the 
natural law of nervous reaction is modified by inhibition — Reflection 
is made possible by this inhibition-caused gap. 

§ 11. (pp. 37-38.) Education as a process of world-building — 
Each person by his mental activity builds up a world for himself — 
The "outer" has an existence for the individual only as he makes 
it "inner." 

§ 12. (pp. 38.) Education as a process of othering — This de- 
scription emphasizes the abstract aspect of separate educative acts, 
but neglects the dynamic effect of experience upon the self — It sets 
up a standard of what constitutes an educative activity. 

§ 13. (pp. 39-40.) Education as a process of removing a tension 
between the ideal and the real — This description is true of voluntary 
acts — In education there are the two processes of establishing a ten- 
sion and of removing it — The doctrine of estrangement, as given by 
Rosenkranz, can be stated as a process of becoming explicitly what 
the self implicitly is. 

§ 14. (pp. 40-43.) Education as "a process of socialization — 
The social character of the process of education is seen in the influence 
which adults exert over children — Social fife is both actual and ideal 
— The ideal grows out of the actual — Socialization has in it the stages 
of reactive behavior, conscious imitation, the interpretation of 
symbols, and the setting up of ends for one's self — The presence of 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 293 

society influences one's development — This description of the process 
is both inclusive and specific. 

Chapter IV. The Materials of Education. Pp. 44-62. 

§ 15. (pp. 44-52). The social reference of elementary school 
subjects — (a)-Language socializes the individual in two ways — 
Language becomes an expressive symbolism only by being associated 
with contents — Reading, writing, spelling, grammar, drawing, color 
work, etc., have socializing values — (b)-Arithmetic is social in its 
origin and in its reference — (c)-Geography includes present social 
adjustments — (d)-Literature treats of possible social adjustments 
— (e)-Construction work (including manual training) gives a basis 
for social sympathy and action — (g) -Elementary nature study 
gives one a sense of present social controls of nature and also a cer- 
tain degree of power to serve, to enjoy, and to think. 

§ 16. (pp. 52-56.) The materials of education may be classified 
as institutions, industries, sciences, and arts, each of which has a 
social reference — Participation in institutional life is fundamental — 
Industries have a social reference — The narrowing effects of the di- 
vision of labor are to be overcome by training in typical industrial ac- 
tivities — Science has grown out of the arts (concrete doings) of 
civilization — To become truly human, the child should become sci- 
entific — Arts are distinctively social in their nature. 

§ 17. (pp. 56-57.) The materials of education as equipping one 
to act effectively in all relations — The child must adjust himself to 
natural laws — Social institutions also demand conformity — Ethi- 
cal conduct is in harmony with law — So, too, religion implies con- 
formity to God's laws — The result of one's being in harmony with 
natural, institutional, ethical, and religious laws is freedom. 

§ 18. (pp. 57-59.) The relation of the materials of education to 
the making of an honorable living — Self-support through social ser- 
vice is the duty of every adult person — All things related to one's occu- 
pation or to one's enjoyment are educative materials — Books are 
educative when they summarize and integrate experiences — School 
studies are not the exclusive educative materials. 

§ 19. (pp. 59-62.) The relation of knowledge, culture, and 
character — Knowledge is mental control, or the reconstruction of 
those relationships which inhere in things — Transient and permanent 
knowledge are not equally formative — Use is necessary to permanent 
control — A desirable organization of self is character — The acqui- 
sition of knowledge forms character — Culture is the power to enjoy 



294 APPENDIX — ANALYTICAL STUDY 

the things that make for mental and spiritual advancement in ideal 
ways — Knowledge, character, and culture are interrelated — The sig- 
nificance of education is found in the re-creation by the child of his 
race inheritance. 

Chapter V. Method in Education. Pp. 63-85. 

The fundamental question of method is, How does the child re- 
create his race inheritance? — Method is the reverse of the process by 
which the child learns — Essentially, the mind learns by experience. 

§ 20. (pp. 64-69.) Involuntary experience has forms called 
spontaneous movement, reflex action, sensory action, impulsive tend- 
encies and movements, instinctive action, physiological suggestion, 
sensori-motor suggestion, and ideo-motor suggestion — The connota- 
tion of words is suggestion based on association — Consciousness is 
not simply a picture of the world — Mental activity in these simple 
forms seems almost to fall within the conservation of energy. 

§ 21. (pp. 69-71.) Conscious imitation — Analysis and synthe- 
sis are presupposed in mental development — Conscious imitation 
implies both motor and mental syntheses — " Bare " imitation is 
merely motor synthesis — The child becomes human and social by 
genuine imitation — Power and tendency are the outcome of imitation. 

§ 22. (pp. 71-74.) Discovery — The mental construction which 
corresponds with things as they are is discovery — Only things that 
exist can be discovered — Accidental and planned discovery are very 
different — The relation of the hypothesis to planned discovery is 
important and close. — Discovered things have vital relations to 
one's life — Discovery is related to thinking by cause and effect — Dis- 
covery can not be a universal schoolroom method. 

§ 23. (pp. 74-75.) Invention — Invention is original synthesis 
to which there is no corresponding objective reality in the natural 
world — Tentative theories are essential to invention — Re-invention 
is educative. 

§ 24. (pp. 75-76.) Self-activity — A primary stock of mental 
experience is a necessity in mental development — Elaboration of 
experience is the true order of mental development — The school 
has a twofold function — Re-creation by discovery and invention is 
most highly educative — The two aspects of mental development 
are progressive mental syntheses and adequately expressive sym- 
bolism. 

§ 25. (pp. 76-81.) Other terms used in describing method — 
Observation is anschauung — The mental activity in valuable obser- 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 295 

vation is thinking — Formal object lessons are valueless — Experi- 
ment is allied to controlled observation — Manuals of experiment in 
school education often prove useless — Experimentation is often too 
rapid — The value of discovery and invention in experimentation 
is often overlooked — Reflection has various meanings — Doing is 
fundamental to education, but may easily degenerate into routine — 
The selective activity in occupations is what makes them skilled. 

§ 26. (pp. 81-84.) The Formal Steps — Are said to be a uniform 
method of teaching — Very few things in the curriculum of elemen- 
tary schools can be taught by the method of the formal steps — Con- 
ceptual knowledge is only one phase of mental development, not the 
totality or even the essential phase — The formal steps imply a com- 
pleteness of knowledge which ignores the "circularly progressive", or 
spiral, character of developing experience. 

§ 27. (pp. 84-85.) Method is correlative with ways of learn- 
ing — Some things are naturally learned in one way and some in an- 
other — The teacher should adapt his method to this truth — The sense 
of need in the child is necessary to effective learning and effective 
teaching. 

Chapter VI. Discipline. Pp. 83-114. 

§ 28. (pp. 83-94.) Introduction to the problems of discipline 
— Instruction and discipline are means by which the aim of educa- 
tion is to be realized — Discipline is a positive thing — Discipline is 
difficult because the effect of punishment can not be predicted with 
certainty, the self of the child is variable, and sometimes outside in- 
fluences make for the bad — The fundamental aim of discipline is 
the formation of character — The fundamental principle of method 
of discipline is, one becomes by being — The essential thing in devel- 
opment is that one is formed by his activities — The theory of moral 
development held by the teacher influences his conception of disci- 
pline — The theory of total depravity leads to severity — The theory 
of innate goodness leads to anarchy — The evolutionary theory leads 
to despair — The theory of experience and reflection explains ethical 
development and leads to a sane view of discipline. 

§ 29. (pp. 94-102.) Stages of selfhood in developing children 
— The spontaneous, reflex, instinctive, and sensory stage gives a 
stock of motor images, of coordinations, and tendencies — The ideo- 
motor and unconscious imitation stage gives a crude sense of a frac- 
tion of life and some skill — The setting up of pleasurable ends and 
the seeking of approbation from elders gives rise to a sense of power 



296 APPENDIX — ANALYTICAL STUDY 

and of duty — Seeking distinction with one's peers gives an exaggera- 
ted sense of one's own importance — Self-satisfied and timid stages 
retard mental development — The desire for economic independence 
gives the basis for industry and a sense of how others live — The stage 
of loyalty gives rise to the sense of "social solidarity" — The stage 
of adolescence gives the consciousness of sex and the basis for a phil- 
osophy of life — The child's reaction to the stimulus is what educates 
him — This response depends upon what the child is as well as upon 
the stimulus. 

§ 30. (pp. 102-131.) The meaning and interdependence of 
organization and management — I — The mechanical phases, heating, 
seating, lighting, ventilating, program making, in relation to study, 
recitation, and fatigue are important because of their relation to 
the mental activities of children — II — The spiritual phases — A — 
The course of study indicates what society desires its young to know — 
Social habit is dangerous and common — Only those studies which 
are desirable on social grounds appear in a course of study — Each 
study has a clear social reference and value — The course of study 
changes because of social changes — The order in which the course 
of study is presented is usually determined by the school and is very 
important — The course of study should provide for continuity and 
interest — The course of study should be regarded as an opportunity 
for constructive thinking by each child — (B) — The personal influ- 
ence of the teacher vitalizes the course of study — The unconscious 
influence of the teacher is great — The conscious influence of the 
teacher is, at times, the turning point in a child's career — Self-control, 
sympathy, insight, honesty, consistency, and evenness of temper are 
necessary to the successful teacher — ( C ) — Cooperation in various 
forms constitutes a valuable element of mental training — This ele- 
ment appears in plays and games, in doing necessary things in the 
schoolroom, in drills and marches, in bringing from homes the things 
needed at the school — (D) — The decoration of the schoolroom and 
grounds is an important matter — Art has a value — Decoration 
should be dynamic — Participation in decoration is essential — Ac- 
tive impressions are more educative than passive impressions — 
Beautifying the school yard is a school duty — School gardens and flow- 
ers should develop an art sense — Common things may be used in dec- 



• ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 297 

oration — The spiritual phases of school organization and management 
are a unit in being formative. 

Chapter VII. Discipline (Concluded), Pp. 115-133. 

III. — The social relationships involved — The school is clearly 
a social institution with manifold relations — (A) — Legal relation- 
ships — In loco 'parentis has two meanings — Suspension is a power of 
the teacher and expulsion of the school board — Purchase of supplies 
is also a duty of the board — Prescribed studies should be taught — 
Compulsory attendance laws should be enforced by the proper offi- 
cials — Records, reports, etc., are important — (B) — Extra legal re- 
lationships — The teacher should participate in the community life 
and should visit parents and patrons — Parents and patrons should 
visit the school — Patrons' meetings should be held at the school — 
Teachers should be broad-minded, tactful, slow to anger, and 
skilled in healing wounds — IV. — The conduct phases — Conduct 
is chosen action — False ideals of order are prevalent — (A) — Possi- 
ble conduct situations are easily analyzed — A positive phrasing 
of what conduct should be in various situations is helpful — (B) — 
The prevalent offenses against the order of the school are easily 
tabulated-^-(C) — Offenses spring from causes and from motives — 
Not all punishments are suitable in connection with offenses spring- 
ing from the various causes and motives — (D) — Inhibition by ne- 
gation and by substitution have a wide application to the forma- 
tion of conduct — (E) — Each kind of punishment has a peculiar 
relation to the child's sense of self — Pain becomes a reformative 
agent by association and reflection — The various kinds of punish- 
ment should be judged by their suitability for use in schools. 

§ 31. (pp. 131-133.) Conclusions regarding discipline — The 
purpose of all punishment is reformation — Punishment is only a 
small fraction of discipline — The formative influence of being in- 
terestedly busy is supreme — The growth of the child involves a 
change in selfhood, out of which conduct springs and which is, in 
turn, formed by conduct. 

Chapter VIII. The Recitation. Pp. 134-150. 

§ 32. (pp. 134-135.) What the recitation now is— The literal 
meaning of recitation (saying over again) is still fairly descriptive 
of what the recitation is in many schools — Repetition has survived 
as a school method because of social habit and also because the 
fluency to which it leads is often mistaken for knowledge. 



298 APPENDIX ANALYTICAL STL*DY 

§ 33. (pp. 135-138.) What it is to teach— Changed behavior 
is the evidence of one's having learned — Back of changed behavior 
there must be changed mental life — The change includes both 
sequence and character of mental activities — Teaching is influ- 
encing the sequence or the character of a person's activity. 

§ 34. (pp. 138-146.) The relation of reactive behavior to 
teaching and to learning — Reactive behavior is the source of con- 
sciousness and of the sense of selfhood — James' pedagogical maxim 
"No impression without its correlative expression," is sound — 
The child's reactive behavior both forms and reveals his mental 
activity — The capacity of the child to form habits varies — The 
verbal reaction is insufficient for educative purposes — Reactive 
behavior should precede the mastery of symbols — The study of 
words is profitable to children only when they summarize a wide 
range of concrete experience — The forms of reactive behavior 
(given on p. 141) are the basal things in the motor life of man- 
kind — To become genuinely social the child must participate in 
this motor life of the race — Sensory and motor children differ wide- 
ly in regard to reactive behavior — It is through reactive behavior 
that the child gets Ins sense of himself, his sense of others, and his 
knowledge of things. 

§ 35. (pp. 146-147.) The means at the disposal of the teacher 
to secure reactive behavior — All the teacher can do is to stimulate 
some nerve-ending of the child — The human voice is the best 
educative stimulus and may take the form of a command, a polite 
request, a suggestion, or a question. 

§ 36. (pp. 147-149.) The command and the polite request — 
The command implies that another shall make his will conform to 
the will of the one who utters the command — The negative element 
in the command is abstract — Commands should not infringe on 
the child's rights as a child — Depraved children have usually been 
made so by inhuman treatment — The polite request is usually more 
educative than the command. 

§ 37. (p. 150.) The suggestion — The suggestion merely offers 
a course of action which becomes the child's own by his own 
choice — Teachers should be adepts in the use of suggestion. 

Chapter IX. The Recitation (Concluded). Pp. 151-183. 

§ 38. (pp. 151-179.) The nature and kinds of the question — 
The question is to the teacher what an artist's brush is to him — 
The fundamental purpose of the question is to lead the child to 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 299 

think for himself — Questions may be considered from the points of 
view of their form, the teacher's purpose in asking them, or the 
kind of thinking they require to answer them — 1 — On the basis of 
form — Direct questions provoke too little response and do not 
force the child to forge a connection for himself — Indirect questions 
require complete statements in answer and also require that one 
shall forge a connection for himself — The leading question means 
that the teacher does the thinking for the pupils — Alternative and 
elliptical questions have a very limited value — 2 — On the basis of 
the teacher's purpose — Testing questions are legitimate and should 
be indirect in form — Developing and pivotal questions are very im- 
portant and should have the indirect form — Questions should be 
definite — The teacher should think out the pivotal questions of a 
lesson in. his preparation for it — The developing questions can not 
be well thought out definitely in advance of the lesson — Successful 
oral teaching requires (1) a clear and firm grasping of the new in 
its organic or pivotal aspects, and (2) a process of successively 
developing these aspects by supplying knowledge and by the use of 
questions which, based upon the past experiences of the children, 
lead them to construct the new — Clarifying questions are invalua- 
ble when pupils encounter difficulties in studying — The guiding, 
or signboard, question has a legitimate place in the schoolroom — 3 — 
On the basis of the kind of thinking required to answer them — (a) — 
Natural thinking exists in two forms, contiguity and similarity — 
Contiguity, based on spatial or temporal togetherness, does not 
long excite interest but is valuable when symbols are to be con- 
nected with their appropriate contents — Similarity arises when 
the mind begins to connect its experiences together because of ele- 
ments of internal identity — Thinking by similarity may be stim- 
ulated by careful assignments, suitable class questions, large use 
of comparison, and the general attitude of the teacher — (b) — Caus- 
al thinking is based upon both contiguity and similarity — There are 
two kinds of causation, objective and subjective — The fact that the 
child is prepared to think from effect to cause before he is prepared 
to do the reverse has an important bearing on the matter of method 
in lower grades — Memory of form strongly insisted upon destroys 
causal thinking — Memory of content tends to stimulate causal think- 
ing — Curiosity leads to causal thinking — The teacher should organ- 
ize the subject matter according to its causal connections — To be 
known, a thing must be tied-in with other things — (c) — Logical 
thinking is necessary sequence, in harmony with the nature of things 



300 APPENDIX — ANALYTICAL STUDY 

— Some thinkers regard the necessary truth thus revealed as exter- 
nal while others regard it as subjective — Logical thinking is impli- 
cit in perception and simple judgments of fact — Mathematical prob- 
lems are essentially logical — There are mechanical aspects of arith- 
metic — Imaging the conditions of an arithmetical problem is the 
best way to get at the logical relations involved in it — English gram- 
mar has obvious logical aspects — Parsing and analysis have been 
so highly esteemed because they imply a logical viewing of the words 
which make up sentences — When pupils get only the form of gram- 
mar their study of it is useless — The power of ready and accurate in- 
terpretation and formation of sentences is the valuable outcome of 
grammatical study. 

§ 39. (pp. 179-182.) The assignment — The pupil must be- 
come his own teacher— Through assignments the child should grow 
in power of independent work — Pupils vary at different ages in their 
power to do independent work — The assignment should be' such 
that the pupil can master it by reasonable diligence — A minimum 
assignment for all with extras for those who can do more than the 
others is the best criterion — The assignment should include an aim 
— And have clearly defined limits — Probable difficulties should be 
anticipated in the assignment — The assignment should be even from 
day to day. 

§ 40. (pp. 182.) What pupils should be expected to do in 
their study of assignments — They should get at the pivotal aspects 
of the things studied about by giving undivided attention — And dis- 
cover the relations involved. 

§ 41. (pp. 182-183.) The relation of the study already done 
to the recitation — The recitation should make use of what has been 
learned, but chiefly in new relations — To bring about this reorgan- 
ization of knowledge demands skill in the use of questions and also 
insight. 

§ 42. (pp. 183.) The relation of the problem to teaching — 
The teacher should strive to induce educative activity in pupils — Ed- 
ucative activity utilizes old knowledge in new relations — This con- 
structive thinking is really the solution of a problem — Therefore, 
the teacher should organize and present the material in such a way 
as to stimulate pupils to constructive thinking. 

Chapter X. Realism and Symbolism. Pp. 184-200. 

§ 43. (pp. 184-186.) Realism is mental activity — Symbolism 
is the form by which mental activity may be expressed — The child 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 301 

often gets the bare form from his study in school — Consciousness 
arises through motor responses to stimuli. 

§ 44. (pp. 186-187.) The formative influence of motor atti- 
tude — Motor attitude prefigures feeling — Physical training and mili- 
tary discipline are valuable because of the mental tone they impart 
— Expressive attitudes are formative attitudes. 

§ 45. (pp. 187-191.) The character of conventionalized sym- 
bols — Conventionalized attitudes are not formative and are imita- 
tively acquired — Symbols have varying reaches of validity — Chil- 
dren have a tendency to invent symbols in their plays — The con- 
ventionalized symbol has a wide validity, but is a small, constrained, 
motor activity — Symbols give permanence and stability to mental 
life — The symbol is valuable as it expresses an appreciated content 
and thereby leads to a better command over it — The neglect of the 
truths of this section constitute the pedagogical blunder of the ages 
— Realism is the first concern of the teacher. 

§ 46. (pp. 191-193.) The influence of realism on methods — 
Reading has proved very responsive to the demands of realism — 
The alphabet, word, and phonic methods have been found to be form- 
al if universalized and made into an exclusive method — The changes 
in the method of teaching geography of the past fifty years have been 
due to the growing recognition of the demands of realism. 

§ 47. (pp. 193-197.) The values of conventionalized sym- 
bols to teaching — They constitute an effective, rapid, and definite 
method of conveying one's thoughts to another — Gesture adds much 
of meaning to words, for words once had a motor meaning — Expres- 
sion is a test of thought and necessary to its highest development 
— When one has acquired the power to translate symbols into 
equivalent ideas he can broaden his experience to include, ideally 
at least, the experiences of the race — There is always danger of 
verbalism — Variety of expression is the best safeguard against 
verbalism. 

§ 48. (pp. 197-200.) Conclusion on the formative influence 
of motor activity — This formative influence is seen in the physical 
tone of a schoolroom — 'Tress against the environment" is a good 
motto — The higher mental activities are matrixed in motor activity 
— Habitual motor activity loses its formative power, save in the pro- 
duction of stupidity — The curriculum is recognizing the true place of 
motor activity in elementary education — Symbolism should always 
be subordinated to realism. 



302 APPENDIX — ANALYTICAL SUMMARY 

Chapter XI. Stages of Knowledge and Stages of Instruc- 
tion. Pp. 201-227. 

There are stages, or levels, in the development of the child's 
knowledge, and these influence the method of teaching. 

§ 49. (pp. 201-204.) An analysis of knowledge reveals but two 
stages in thinking — The difference between an image and a concept 
is largely one that exists in definition only- -No person 's thinking is 
wholly of either type. 

§ 50. (pp. 204-227.) Sub-stages of image thinking — A — Wonder 
and name-getting — Wonder is the attitude, of searching for further 
associations of a given thing — Blase means that the thing does not 
excite any desire for further knowledge — Wonder leads the child 
into all sorts of activity — B — Make-believe and fancy — These elements 
develop early in the child's life — Make-believes are valuable because 
of their social reference — The child's fancy usually needs stimulat- 
ing — C — Dramatization, games, and imitation of social activities— 
These activities are consciously performed — Through imitative per- 
formance comes a new sense of selfhood — The elements thus ob- 
tained are valuable to the extent of serviceably associated habit — 
The dramatization of stories yields the best results because of the 
social element involved — Games involve group cooperation and are 
valuable because of this fact, because of the stimulus to invent within 
the rules, the physical exercise involved in them, and because of 
the permanent disposition to open air enjoyments which they foster 
— Many social processes should be imitated — Political processes 
offer a fine field for advanced grades — The necessity for government 
should be apparent to the child in the school — A spirit of social 
solidarity should be awakened — Daily political attitude is more im- 
portant than simply making a great ado over election day — Pupil 
participation in school government does not necessarily imply an 
organization like that of the state — Conventional forms of social 
behavior are easily taught, but there is danger that the child may 
not enter into their real spirit — The place of industrial and commer- 
cial processes is very important — Among these the most important 
are : tilling the soil, extermination of pests, domestication of animals, 
weaving, simple domestic activities, making and beautifying things 
for use in the home, and exchange — Each community has other 
industrial prosesses with which the child should become acquainted 
— Some complex processes should be symbolically performed — D — - 
Individual achievement, distinction, and invention — These elements 
mingle in the child's life — Some teachers by their method tend to 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 303 

discourage invention — Invention may and should be stimulated — 
Self-reliance is the outcome of independent action — E — Causal think- 
ing first arises from sense-contact^-Human motive is also a cause to 
the child — There are no absolute age-and-mental-orders in the child's 
life. 

Chapter XII. Stages of Knowledge and Stages of Instruction 
(Concluded). Pp. 228-252. 

§ 51. (pp. 228-252.) Sub-stages of conceptual thinking — Con- 
cepts come into existence through the reflective activity of the mind 
— A — Concept forming, classification, and definition — Similarity is 
necessary to concept forming — Definition is a process of telling what 
one means by his concepts — Words name objects and also express 
mental syntheses — B — Judgment forming and opinion making — Judg- 
ment is a mental syntheses — The definitive judgment is a judgment 
of meaning — An analytic judgment simply unfolds what is implicit 
in its subject — A synthetic judgment adds an element to its subject 
— Science is the outcome of conceptual thinking — Individuals mean 
more when interpreted in light of the essential relations implied 
in concepts — Not all things worthy of being taught have a concep- 
tual character — Concept forming is a very valuable element in mental 
development — The child may be led to the formation of synthetic 
judgments by imitation, by discovery, by grading the difficulties, 
by making large and intelligent use of comparison, by proceeding 
as slowly as the child thinks, and by a sincere, appreciative attitude 
of the teacher — As the child grows in power of independent thought, 
he forms opinions for himself — The teacher has an important func- 
tion with respect to the child's tendency to form opinions for him- 
self — C — Causal thinking and the formation of personal attitudes — 
Concepts enable the child to explain things in their causal terms — 
The child becomes interested in the qualitative aspects of world- 
forces — This interest is qualitative rather than quantitative — 
Since the child is interested in these world-forces, he forms personal 
attitudes toward them — D — Logical thinking and systematization — 
Through his varied experiences the child comes to appreciate the 
necessary relations between things — He thus apprehends the inner 
nature or essence of things — This necessary element in thinking is 
called the logical — The logical element plays an important part in 
all inductive thinking — As the child becomes mature the logical re- 
lations of things become explicit in his consciousness — Arithmetic 
and grammar furnish ample scope for logical thinking — These studies 



304 APPENDIX — ANALYTICAL SUMMARY 

have lost their former prestige because other subjects have come to 
be taught so as to involve logical thinking — The perception of the 
necessary relations between judgments reveals to the child the logic 
of life — The teacher should strive to have the child form a sane and 
helpful philosophy of life. 

Chapter XII. Interest and Attention. Pp. 253-267. 

§ 52. (pp. 253-257.) Introductory and descriptive — Interest 
is the felt value of a stimulus to the self that feels — Uniformity of 
environment deadens interest — Habit in adjustment is usually 
the point at which interest subsides — Attention is the adjustment 
of the self to a stimulus — The mind attends with its ideas — A change 
in the object is necessary to continued attention — Reflection is a 
process of self-initiated and exhaustive adjustment to a stimulus — 
The activity which is initiated by the felt worth of an end is the 
most educative. 

§ 53. (pp. 257-259.) The relation of attention to the formation 
of the self — The formative influence of involuntary and unconscious 
attention is very great — A school is designed to secure the attention 
of children to certain definite things — Attention and interest are 
closely related in school work — Baldwin's view of apperception shows 
the clear relation of attention to the formation of the self — Maximum 
attention means both maximum apperception and maximum organ- 
ization of the self. 

§ 54. (pp. 259-261.) Class attention depends upon what is 
taught, on the way in which the teaching is done, and upon the per- 
sonality of the teacher. 

§ 55. (pp. 261-263.) Class attention depends upon class in- 
terest, the conformity of the teaching to the laws of attention, the 
motor attitude of teacher and pupils, the technique of the teacher's 
questions, and the class opinion of the teacher. 

§ 56. (pp. 263-264.) Participation is the real secret of class in- 
terest and attention — There are reciprocal relations between con- 
structive thinking and interest and attention — Participation means re- 
discovering, re-believing, re-inventing, and re-living the life of the race. 

§ 57. (pp. 264-265.) Habits of attention are formed by repeti- 
tion of acts of attention — The amount of repetition necessary to the 
formation of a habit of attention depends upon the vividness of the 
original experience, or the amount of the self which is involved in 
the experience — In this process the danger of "closed habits of at- 
tention" is very great. 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION: 305 

§ 58. (pp. 266-267.) The development of permanent lines of 
interest is of vital concern — School and life should be a unity — The 
awakening of permanent lines of interest through school work is 
essential to the highest efficiency of elementary education. 

Chapter XIV. The Professional Preparation of the Teacher. 

Pp. 268-276. 

§ 59. (pp. 268-270.) The teacher should understand social 
life — To do this, he must understand the heart of history — Present 
society is dynamic — The teacher should, therefore, understand 
the ideal tendencies of society out of which social changes come — 
Ideals prepare one to live effectively in the changed social life that 
progress inevitably brings. 

§ 60. (pp. 270-272.) The teacher should understand the child— 
In child study there are advantages and dangers — Physical, intel- 
lectual, emotional, and volitional development are closely inter- 
dependent and are variable in different children. 

§ 61. (pp. 272-275.) The teacher should have skill in using the ma- 
terials of education — The problem for the teacher is the massing of 
educative materials in such a way as to bring about the maximum 
social development of each child — Errors should be stepping stones 
— Criticism should be helpful and truthful— Opportunities for the 
professional growth of the teacher are very different in country 
schools, village schools, city schools, and training classes — Blind 
experience is supplemented by cadetting, work in city training 
schools, normal schools, and schools of education — The doom of 
inefficiency in schools seems sealed. 

§ 62. (pp. 275-276.) The teacher's conception of his work and 
his fundamental motive in life have much to do with his efficiency 
— Consciousness of significance gives dignity to the work of teaching 
— The fundamental desire of the teacher should be to help forward 
the life of the race to higher and better levels. 

Chapter XV. Summary of Theses. Pp. 277-289. 

1. Education is inevitable. 

2. Education ought to be a progressive socialization by parti- 
cipation. 

3. This progressive socialization should be both actual and 
ideal. 

4. The various stages or degrees of mental activity may be 
stated as : 



306 APPENDIX — ANALYTICAL SUMMARY 

(a) Involuntary experience, imitation, discovery, invention, 
and self -activity ; or as 

(b) Image and conceptual thinking; or as 

(c) Primary and derived activities. 

6. The school should be so organized that the child thinks 
for himself and thus re-creates his race inheritance. 

7. The scope of the school should be such that, supplemented 
as it is by extra-schoolroom experiences, the child builds up a sane 
view of life and develops an ethical attitude toward the actual and 
the ideal. 

8. The problem is the means, par excellence, for rightly con- 
ditioning the child. 

9. The aim and the pivotal question are problems for the child 
to solve. 

10. The materials of instruction shuld be organized into units 
or topics which, when worked out as a series of problems, give the 
material usually included in such subjects as geography, history, 
drawing, spelling, composition, etc. 

11. The teacher should develop a sense of need in the child 
and not rely wholly upon the already established interests of the 
child. 

12. Since all consciousness tends to become motor in its con- 
sequences, and since the motor realization of an idea integrates 
it as an element of character, all forms of expressive and construc- 
tive experience should be fostered by the school. 

13. To be interestedly busy in doing worthy things is the best 
kind of discipline. 

14. When conduct springs from selfishness or meanness, inhi- 
bition by substitution is the best mode of dealing with it, but corporal 
punishment is a last resort. 

15. Education is such a complex thing that the school be- 
comes what it should be only when all the forces involved work to- 
gether harmoniously and effectively 



PART II. 

Additional Topics for Study, Discussion, and Report. 

These topics for further study are introduced to afford an op- 
portunity for students to react in an original way to the main argu- 
ment of the text. The topics are numerous enough to provide work 
for a dozen or more persons engaged in informal round table dis- 
cussion. It is believed that the working out of these topics will 
throw a flood of light upon the text, will give rise to a keener insight 
into the problems and processes of elementary education, and will 
give birth to a sense of power that can never come from the mastery 
of a book. Worked out in connection with the text, these topics 
will probably prove more valuable than the text itself. 

A person, or even a group of persons, working in this way should 
feel no sense of discouragement over the fact that not all of the ex- 
ercises yield answers readily. A list of references in which answers 
could be found would defeat the fundamental purpose of these ex- 
ercises, viz., to furnish a stimulus to constructive thinking. The 
Analytical Summary and the Index will be found helpful in tracing 
out the references of the text to the topics given. 

Chapter I. Introductory. Pp. 11-17. 

1. Make a list of the things done by a child of elementary 
school age during a half hour in school and a half hour on the play- 
ground or at some kind of work. Classify them as (1) Natural, 
and (2) Acquired (learned) Actions. From whom and how has 
he learned each? If possible, compare with the results of a simi- 
lar study of a child under three years of age. How can you decide 
whether a given thing has been learned or was inborn in a child? 

2. Write an account of how some elderly person of your ac- 
quaintance has learned some particular new thing. 

3. Show why each description of the process of education (giv- 
en on p. 12) is valid from the point of view of the one that gave it. 

4. Consider the conditions that existed where you now live 
when the Indians or the early pioneers lived there. Write a sketch 
of "Indian Education" or "Pioneer Education in the Home and in 
the School," showing in detail the things which the child needed to 
know and how he was taught them. Compare the list of things to 

307 



308 APPENDIX TOPICS FOR STUDY 

be learned then and now. At what age did a child then become 
mature? At what age now? 

5. Write an account of how a teacher organized and conducted 
a school in pioneer days. Contrast the curriculum with that of the 
present day. How do you explain the difference? What was the 
method of teaching in the pioneer schools? 

6. Show why "the formation of socially efficient moral indi- 
viduals" demands that the teacher be a specialist in ethics, psychol- 
ogy, and the subject matter to be taught. 

Chapter II. The Aim of Education and the Function of the 
School. Pp. 19-32. 

1. Write out, as fully as possible, the "filling" given by each 
of the school studies. 

2. Trace out in detail the steps in the change of opinion in a 
social group with respect to some particular thing. What part of 
this change is due to the means of communication? 

At the close of the Revolutionary War many people thought 
the union of the Colonies would be shortlived. It was held that the 
Colonies could not agree because of the physical impossibility of 
getting together frequently enough to understand each other. Es- 
timate, in light of the above, the part played by invention in the de- 
velopment of the idea of national unity. Read Emerson's essay on 
"The Fortune of the Republic." 

3. A radical is one who believes that some one policy, or prin- 
ciple, or truth would, if allowed to control, improve the existing or- 
der of tilings. A conservative is one who is satisfied with an aspect 
of the existing order of things. Each person is, therefore, a radical 
with respect to some things and a conservative with respect to other 
things. What effect has diversity of employment upon the devel- 
opment of radicalism? Of conservatism? Which predominates in 
the country? In villages? In cities? How is the above shown in 
the educational ideals of the separate groups? 

4. How has it come about that so many people believe in the 
"knowledge ideal" of education? 

5. It is often asserted that the congenitally deaf seldom, if 
ever, become thoroughly humanized. Explain why this might be true. 

6. Make a list of the ideals of what a number of children desire 
to become when grown up. Compare these ideals on the basis 
of sex, age, motor ability, breadth of experience, and influence of 
literature read. Which is the more influential in determining ideals 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 309 

at different ages in boys and in girls: the influences of the home, of 
the school, of industrial society, of literature? What does this analy- 
sis reveal regarding the present influence of the school? To what 
extent does the series of ideals thus analyzed correspond to the de- 
velopment of racial ideals? 

7. Write a detailed account of what is included in the educa- 
tional ideals of (a) a country community, and (b) a city of five 
thousand or more population. Explain both the elements of like- 
ness and of difference. 

8. Look up the "New England Academies" and define their 
ideal. Why do so many people of independent means regard the 
education of girls as "a set of accomplishments"? 

9. What difference is there in the end usually sought by stu-' 
dios where music and drawing are taught and by training in these 
things in the public school? Under what conditions would piano 
lessons be given regularly to all pupils in the public schools? 

10. Analyze out the "institutional participation" which is in 
a child's experience before he comes to school. This analysis lays 
bare what aspect of school education? 

11. Write a defense of "Occupations" as a school subject, 
showing (a) the necessity for it and its values, (b) the grades through 
which it should extend, and (c) the sort of occupation that is suited 
to pupils in the several grades. 

Chapter III. The Meaning of Education. Pp. 33-43. 

1. In the quotation from James (p. 33), education is said to be 
organization, and not simply acquisition of habits. What does this dis- 
tinction mean, and how does it influence one's conception of education? 

2. Taking the list of learned things (found in topic 1, under 
Chapter II above), show upon what natural tendencies (or tendency) 
each is based. When your list of "natural tendencies" is complete 
compare it with the one given in James' Talks to Teachers, pp. 45-63. 

3. Collect a dozen or more cases, from four or five successive 
grades in a school, of unthoughted action on the part of girls and 
boys, and explain the result in terms of the explanation given on 
pp. 36-37 of the text. 

4. Taking the data collected regarding children's ideals (topic 
6, Chapter II, above), explain the whole mass in terms of world-build- 
ing. What are the various ways in which one may build a world? 

5. It is often said, "Desire is everything." Defend this prop- 
osition in terms of the argument outlined on pp. 39-40 of the text. 



310 APPENDIX TOPICS FOR STUDY 

6. Show the necessary relation of sequence which exists be- 
tween the successive stages of socialization (as given on pp. 40-43.) 

Chapter IV. The Materials of Education. Pp. 44-62. 

1. In connection with topic 3, Chapter II (above), explain the 
long survival of the catechetical method of instruction. Why did 
formal methods of teaching outlive the ox-cart? Under such meth- 
ods of teaching what subjects were most readily taught? Give two 
explanations of why the early schools of our country devoted them- 
selves so exclusively to certain of the language studies. 

2. What were the reasons that led to the introduction of geog- 
raphy, history, literature, nature study, and construction work into 
the schools? How did the first results compare with the reasons 
urged for their introduction? 

3. Explain what is meant by the phrase, "psychologically at 
home in geography." What more than a knowledge of geography 
is implied in this phrase? What is meant by mature, as applied to 
a person? 

4. Soap making is, as now carried on in large factories, a "sci- 
entific process." How was soap made by the pioneers? How did 
it become a scientific process ? Compare your answer with that of 
Spencer (given in substance on pp. 54-55). What are the prospects 
that teaching will soon become a scientific process? 

5. What value had the catechism and the New England Primer 
as means of religious training? To what extent is it defensible to 
have formal instruction outstrip experience in religious training? 

6. Accepting as true the statement, Realities only are educa- 
tive, visit a school; make a list of things done by the pupils; divide 
these into the following classes : (a) realities, (b) derived from reali- 
ties, (c) beyond the children. Why are children usually so anxious 
for recesses and holidays? 

7. Taking the following statement as a criterion, visit a school 
and note the proportion of time given to each kind of work: The 
child should re-create his race inheritance and gain the power to 
convey his thoughts to others. 

8. Why are painting, music, and literature regarded as being 
so rich in cultural values? If these things were universally appre- 
ciated and enjoyed, what effect would this have on their culture value? 

Chapter V. Method in Education. Pp. 63-85. 

1. Observe a child about a year old for about an hour, keep- 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 311 

ing tab on the various things it does. Classify these things into the 
forms of involuntary experience (given on pp. 61-67) and conscious 
imitation. Or, have eight people observe, each taking notes on a 
certain kind of activity. On the basis of the results thus obtained, 
estimate the values of involuntary experience in giving to a child 
his basal mental contents. 

2. Observe a child about three years old, as above, and make 
a list of the things which it has imitatively acquired as these appear 
in its actions. Or, select a child in the first grade for observation. 

3. Similarly, watch a group of children for a longer period, 
keeping count of their discoveries, and grouping them as accidental 
and planned discoveries. 

A boy in school found a way to remember the table of 9's. The 
last digit in the successive products diminishes from nine to zero. 
The sum of the digits in the successive products is nine. The first 
digit is one less than the multiplier and increases by one in the suc- 
cessive products. This boy, for illustration, when asked, "Seven 
times nine are how many?" thinks, "Seven less one is six; six from 
nine leaves three; sixty-three." What kind of discovery was this? 
What value had it for this boy? What value would it have for oth- 
ers who learned it imitatively? In what ways is the boy's plan an 
inconvenience? (Compare with the idea expressed on pp. 140 and 165.) 

4. Observe children at play and collect illustrations of inven- 
tions. In what sense is literature, especially the fairy tale, the myth, 
Robinson Crusoe, Aesop's Fables, etc., really an invention? How 
should the child learn literature, by repetition or by invention? 

5. Show that an act which might, if performed by a child, be called 
self -activity would not, if performed by an adult, deserve the name at all. 

6. Write an account of how object lessons were conducted 
when you were a pupil in the lower grades and compare that method 
with the one now in vogue. 

7. Write down a list of the experiments which you remember 
to have performed in a course in physics or chemistry in high school, 
and then compare this list with the actual list. Explain your dis- 
covery in light of what is said regarding experiment on pp. 77-79. 

8. Watch pupils in the successive grades at their school work, 
and note how much, relatively, there is of each of the kinds of think- 
ing listed on p. 85. Do the same when they are left to themselves. 
Compare the results and say whether you think the school is organ- 
ized in accordance with the way in which the child's mind naturally 
develops. 



312 APPENDIX — TOPICS FOR STUDY 

Chapters VI and VII. Discipline. Pp. 86-133. 

1. Note children just entering school to see if you can tell 
what theories of the moral nature of the child are held by their par- 
ents. Give numerous illustrations of the principle, Reactive conduct 
forms character. 

2. Find cases in which children fall into the successive stages 
of selfhood (pp. 94-101) and note things that are characteristic. If 
possible, study a group of boys that is just becoming a "gang," and 
also a group that is seeking distinction by "dare" feats of all kinds. 
Does the change in social attitude precede, develop along with, or 
follow after, the characteristic motor activity of the stage? 

3. Taking the course of study with which you are most famil- 
iar, compare it with the standards set up on pp. 104-107. If there 
are any deviations, explain why they exist. 

4. Compare the qualities of the best teacher of your acquaint- 
ance with those given on pp. 107-110. What qualities should be 
added to the given list? 

5. Make a study of the cooperative activity that takes place 
in a given school and compare it with that given on pp. 110-114. 
What are the advantages of such cooperative activity and what are 
its most obvious dangers? 

6. Make a study of what are called "school troubles," that is, 
cases in which the patrons and the teacher do not work together har- 
moniously, and classify the basal causes of the trouble. 

7. Show that each of the prevalent school offenses is really a 
deviation from the ideal (as given on p. 120) of what the pupil's 
conduct should be. Analyze the prevalent offenses to see if any causes 
or motive are found that do not fit into the list given on p. 122. 

8. Find in your own experiences instances in which the sepa- 
rate kinds of punishment, listed on p. 127, have been applied to you. 
With regard to each, state clearly just what the offense was, what 
led you to commit it, what punishment was inflicted, by whom, its 
severity or lenity, and how it affected you both as regarded your atti- 
tude toward the one who administered it to you and toward similar 
possible offenses. (If this exercise is worked out carefully by a num- 
ber of people, the results for each kind of punishment as related to 
a given kind of offense can be tabulated, and thus an estimate of the 
value of the different kinds of punishment can be arrived at and a 
comparison with the conclusions of the text be made.) 

9. It is sometimes said of one that he succeeds in teaching but 
fails in discipline. Compare this statement with the one made in 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 313 

the text, "Nine-tenths of the problem of discipline is solved if chil- 
dren are kept interestedly busy doing worthy things." 

Chapters VIII and IX. The Recitation. Pp. 134-183. 

1. Which of the forms of reactive behavior, given on p. 141, 
are most suitable for use in schools? Write out a defense for the use 
of each one which you feel should go into the curriculum of the ele- 
mentary school. How does one become many-sided? Narrow? What 
occupations make for many-sidedness? For narrowness? 

2. Write out, in detail, a case known to you in which arbitrary 
commands have resulted in hardening the one commanded. Make 
a list of "children's rights." 

3. (a) Collect questions heard in a schoolroom on different 
subjects, analyze and classify them on the basis of the outline on p. 
152, keeping careful count of each by subjects. In which subjects 
are the questions the poorest? Explain this either in terms of the 
inherent difficulty of the subject or of the teacher's meagre mastery 
of it. To what else might this poor questioning be due? (This ex- 
ercise should be performed by several people, each one observing 
different teachers.) 

(b) Some people say that they, being blindfolded, can judge 
accurately of a teacher's efficiency by simply hearing the questions 
asked, and that they can also judge accurately by reading a steno- 
graphic report of a class exercise. What do you think of this stand- 
ard of judging a teacher's efficiency? 

(c) Try to group the various kinds of mental activity (given on 
p. 85), and the stages of selfhood (given on pp. 94-101) under (a) 
natural thinking, (b) causal thinking, (c) logical thinking (given on 
pp. 163-179). Explain how they happen to fit together or fail to 
fit together, as the case may be. 

4. Make a study of the kinds of thinking done by pupils in va- 
rious grades. What kind predominates in the successive grades? 
How do you explain this? Which are the best at causal and logical 
thinking in the several grades, boys or girls? Explain your answer. 
How about logical thinking among men and women? Give reasons 
for your answer. In what sorts of things are boys, girls, men, and 
women most interested? What is the relation between ability to 
think in certain ways and prevailing interests? 

5. Compare the assignment actually made by a teacher with 
the understanding which a class has of what the assignment is. Ex- 
plain the result of several observations based on assignments that 



314 APPENDIX — TOPICS FOR STUDY 

range from simple to complex. What maxims, or principles, should 
control the assignment? 

6. Make a study of what children actually do in their study 
of assignments. What is the proportion of real study to dawdling? 

7. Observe a recitation noting how much of re-cit-ing, and of 
constructive thinking there really is in it for the pupils. 
Chapter X. Realism and Symbolism. Pp. 184-200. 

1. Collect from your own experience and that of others (in- 
cluding children) instances in which bare symbolism was all that the 
supposed learner got from his efforts. What tendency would a cate- 
chetical method of teaching have? 

2. Write out cases in which children have used arbitrary sym- 
bols in their plays or in stories made up by them. Also, write out 
cases in winch children have developed a language of their own or 
have had "ideal playmates" and a language for them. All these 
cases show what tendency? 

3. Describe the method by which you were taught to read or 
the method you use in teaching reading and estimate the relative 
amounts of realism and symbolism there was (or is) in it for the learn- 
er. 

4. The best "form" for a runner, a hurdler, a jumper, a dis- 
cus hurler, or any athlete, is that way of doing the thing in question 
which will lead to the best achievement of which the person is capa- 
ble. Similarly, in geography, the child should become familiar 
with the form which will summarize his thinking and which is, at 
the same time, a stimulus to further thinking. Why then does one 
so easily forget the latitude and longitude of places, the rules for the 
subjunctive in Latin, the dates of events in history, etc.? Make a 
list of the things which you find children readily forget and explain 
why they forget them. 

5. Make a list of your own experiences in which interest has 
been an outgrowth of concrete activity. 

Chapters XI and XII. Stages of Knowledge and Stages of 
Instruction. Pp. 201-252. 

1. Make studies of children who are in the several sub-stages 
of thinking outlined in the text. Connect these sub-stages of think- 
ing with the stages of selfhood (pp. 94-102). 

2. Make a special study of a group of eighth grade pupils to 
discover how much acquaintance with and control of racial activi- 
ties (r to x, pp. 217-221) they have. On the basis of the results ob- 



ELEMENTARY EDUCATION 315 

tained, form a conclusion as to the socializing worth of their present 
education. 

3. Make a special study of a group of children that seem to 
be in stage 4 (pp. 98-99) and sub-stage D (pp. 221-224). Make a 
list of the foolish things to which children are led by their love of dis- 
tinction. What relation has the child's ascendant desire to "ob- 
streperousness" at school? What is the effect of closely prescribed 
conduct and study upon future originality? 

4. What relation is there between personification and causal 
thinking from sense-contact? 

5. Why are there contradictory views regarding the value of 
definition as a school exercise? 

6. Collect evidence to show that opinion-making is epidemic 
among children during certain stages of development. 

7. What is the difference between opinion-making and the 
formation of personal attitudes? Connect the latter with the desire 
for economic independence and the stage of loyalty (pp. 99-101). 

8. Write a defense of the following proposition : 

All logical thinking demanded of pupils in the elementary 
school should be directly based on concrete experience or upon clear 
definite images derived from such experience. 

Examine a series of school arithmetics, an English grammar, and 
the portion of a text on geography devoted to mathematical geog- 
raphy in light of the foregoing, and make a list of the things that do 
not conform to the requirements set up. If any things are found 
that do not conform, explain why they are included in the books. 

Chapter XIII. Class Interest and Attention. Pp. 253-267. 

1. Make observation of classes at work and note whether the 
interest and attention are found to depend upon the things outlined 
on pp. 259-263. 

2. Note for a considerable length of time the work of a group 
of school children and make a list of the permanent lines of interest 
that seem to be set up by their work. 

Inventory your own permanent interests, and note the ones that 
had their origin in your school experiences. Compare this list with 
others obtained by questioning some of your friends. What con- 
clusion do you draw as to the efficiency of the school in this respect? 

Chapter XIV. Preparation of the Teacher. Pp. 268-276. 

1. Estimate a half dozen teachers, including yourself and the 

best teacher of your acquaintance, in light of the main points of 



316 APPENDIX — TOPICS FOR STUDY 

Chapter XIV and of the Preface of this book. What additional cri- 
teria for the efficiency of the teacher do you set up? 

Chapter XV. Summary of Theses. Pp. 277-289. 

1. Write your own argument to prove or disprove each of the 
fifteen propositions which form the substance of Chapter XV. 

2. Using the Index and the fifteen propositions of Chapter 
XV, collect the material which is summarized from the book by these 
theses. 

3. Make a list of the ''educational reforms" that you know 
something about, and judge them by the appropriate propositions 
in Chapter XV. Why are so many so-called "reforms" spasmodic 
and transient? 



GENEEAL INDEX 



Accidental discovery, 71. 

Achievement, stage of individual, 221- 
24. 

Action, ideo-inotor, 67 ; instinctive, 
65-6 ; impulsive, 65 . reflex, 64 ; 
sensory, 65. 

Active impressions, 113. 

Activities, imitation of social, 211-21 ; 
real and symbolical, 42. 

Activity, as a formative thing, 199 ; 
limit of educative motor, 199. 

Adaptation, to natural environment, 
taught in homes, 30. 

Adjustment, value of active, 198 ; 
typical forms of racial, as related 
to education, 278. 

Adolescence, a time of transition to 
interpretation of symbols, 142-3 ; 
stage of, 101. 

Aesthetic enjoyment of nature, 50-1. 

Age-and-mental-orders, usually un- 
real, 227. 

Agriculture, mimic, 217. 

Aim, nature of, 286 ; social, 12 ; of 
education, as formal, static, 21 ; 
same, as spiritual and dynamic, 22- 
3 ; same, formal statements of, 21- 
2 ; same, how teacher's conception 
of influences questioning, 167 ; 
same, of value to the teacher, 15. 

Alligation, as illustrating social habit, 
23. 

Alternative question, 155. 

Analysis, defined, 69 ; logical think- 
ing in grammatical, 177-8. 

Analytic judgment, defined, 230. 

Animal tricks, how learned, 67. 

Anschauung, Pestalozzi's use of, 76-7. 

Appeals to sense of honor, 129. 

Apology, as a form of reparation, 
130 ; when valuable, 130. 

Apperception, as opposed to inhibition, 
37 ; conditioned by attention, 258. 

Approbation of elders, sought by the 
child, 98. 

Arithmetic, mechanical aspects of, 
177 ; responsive to social usage, 
47 ; social origin of, 47 ; social 
value of, 47 ; why hard for some 
people, 248-9 ; why it has lost its 
former position in elementary edu- 
cation, 248. 

Arithmetical problems, the nature of, 
175. 

Arrangement of course of study, 106. 

Arrested development, danger of, 265. 



Artist, defined, 15. 

Artist-teacher, 13. 

Arts, kinds of, 55 ; meaning of, 55 ; 
social reference of, 55. 

Assignments, as related to aims, 181 ; 
even from day to day, 182 ; as re- 
lated to probable difficulties of pu- 
pils, 181 ; capable of mastery by 
pupils, 180 ; character of, in the 
different grades, 180 ; should be 
definite, 181 ; should be variable, 
180; study of, by pupils, 182. 

Association, in all learning, 36 ; lim- 
itation of, in alternative questions, 
156. 

Association tracts, relation of, to ad- 
justment, 34. 

Attendance, compulsory, 116. 

Attention, a condition favorable to 
apperception, 258 ; as related to 
change in the object, 256 ; as re- 
lated to change of adjustment, 256 ; 
as related to the formation of the 
self, 257-9 ; as resting upon inter- 
est, 255-6 ; defined, 255 ; formation 
of habits of, 264-5 ; interest neces- 
sary to continuity of, 258 ; of class, 
depends upon various things, 261- 
3 ; related to reflection, 256-7 ; re- 
lation of, to body of ideas, 256 ; the 
real object of, 256 ; unity of, and 
interest, 257 ; value of power of 
voluntary, 255 ; voluntary and in- 
voluntary, 255. 

Attitude, definition of ethical, 284 ; 
formative influence of motor, 186- 
7 ; formation of personal, 239-42 ; 
stages in development of ethical, 
93 ; toward life, how formed, 139. 

Authority, relation of, to social ends, 
211. 

Basis, of mental life is motor, 146-7. 

Beautifying the useful, 219-20. 

Beauty, utility of, 220. 

Becoming, through learning, 43. 

Behavior, a test of learning and 
teaching, 136-8 ; as motor activity, 
139 ; formative influence of reac- 
tive, 142 ; forms of reactive, 141 ; 
social value of forms of reactive, 
143-4. 

Books, when educative, 58. 

Brotherhood of man, 26. 

Busy work, often of no value, 224. 

Cadetting, a means of teacher growth, 
274. 



317 



318 



INDEX 



Carelessness, 123. 

Catechetical questions, objection to, 
154. 

Causal thinking, 239-42 ; and inter- 
est in human affairs, 240 ; as re- 
lated to the child's experiences, 
169-70 ; as related to desire for 
further knowledge, 173 ; as related 
to human action, 242 ; as related 
to insight, 240; described, 167-73; 
effect of memory work on, 170-1 ; 
from sense-contact, 224-7 ; in im- 
ages, illustrated, 224-6 ; leads to 
formation of personal attitudes, 
242 ; relation of, to curiosity, 171- 
2 ; relation of, to suspended judg- 
ment, 172 ; teacher's duty with re- 

. spect to, in pupils, 241-2 ;' univer- 
sality of, 172-3 ; value of principle 
of, to teacher, 172. 

Causation, natural, 168 ; subjective, 
168. 

Cause, relation of, to effect, 169. 

Character, as formed by the "circle 
of thought," 86 ; as related to 
knowledge and culture, 61 ; desir- 
able organization of self is, 60 ; 
evolutionary theory of, 91 ; formed 
by reactive behavior, 88-9. 

Child, as criterion, 257 ; average, 
270 ; debt of civilization to each, 
284 ; schematic outlines of develop- 
ment are dangerous, 270-1 ; 
"spoiled," 99. 

Children, treatment of sluggish, 186- 
7. 

Circular process, 97, 185. 

City training schools, character of, 
274. 

Civic attitude, an outgrowth of daily 
attitude, 212. 

Civics, as present group adjustments, 
49. 

Civilization, debt of, to each child, 
284. 

Clarifying question, discussed and il- 
lustrated, 160-1. 

Class attention, depends on class in- 
terest, 261 ; depends on class opin- 
ion of the teacher, 262-3 ; depends 
on motor attitudes, 262 ; depends 
on teacher's questions, 262 ; re- 
lated to laws of attention, 261-2. 

Classification, defined, 229. 

Class interest, depends on method of 
teaching, 260 ; depends on the per- 
sonality of the teacher, 261 ; de- 
pends on relation of what is taught 
to child's sense of need, 259-60 ; 
depends on what is taught, 259. 

Color work, aesthetic element in, 46 ; 
value of training in, 144. 

Command, abstract forms of, 147 ; 
content of, 148 ; effects of arbitrary, 
149 ; illustration of arbitrary, 148- 
9 ; the nature of, 147-8. 

"Commanded pedagogy," 16. 



Common sense, in teaching, 160. 

Community of interests, 212. 

Compulsion, 123. 

Concept, application of, 232 ; as re- 
lated to science, 231-2 ; defined, 
203, 228; demands a form, 231; 
essentials of, are variable, 228-9 ; 
how formed, 228 ; pedagogy of the, 
231-3 ; summary of values of, to 
mental development, 233 ; the goal 
of instruction, 232. 

Concept-forming, stimulus to, 231. 

Concept thinking, sub-stages of, 228- 
52. 

Conduct, as related to opinion-mak- 
ing, 239 ; defined, 119 ; of pupils, 
119-31 ; outline of conduct situa- 
tions, 120 ; positive ideals of, 120- 
1 ; should grow out of insight, 213 ; 
source of, 284-5. 

Connotation of words, 67-8. 

Cooperation, by homes, 111 ; in 
games, 99, 110 ; in school work, 
110, 111 ; necessary to participa- 
tion, 213 ; spirit of, among pupils, 
212 ; through motor activity, 198. 

Conclusion, regarding discipline, 131. 

Conscious imitation, 69 ; as a stage 
of socialization, 41 ; defined, 69 ; 
two phases of, 70 ; relation of, to 
involuntary experience, 68 ; rela- 
tion of, to power of response, 185-6. 

Conservation of energy, in involun- 
tary experience, 68. 

Consistency, in teacher, 110. 

Constructive thinking, 183. 

Construction work, as related to life, 
50 ; character of, in former schools, 
50. 

Content, defined, 61 ; relation of, to 
form, 185 ; why so often preceded 
by form in schools, 190-1. 

Contiguity, as related to causal think- 
ing, 167 ; small value of, 164 ; 
thinking by, explained, 163-5 ; 
when valuable, 165. 

Control, limit of, over natural things, 
27 ; of symbolism, 28 ; interpreta- 
tive and constructive, of symbolism, 
28; passive and active, 28; value 
of, over natural things, 27 ; quali- 
tative and quantitative, of forces, 
240-1. 

Copy, in dramatization and games, 
207. 

Corporal punishment and loss of so- 
cial position combined, 128-9 ; dis- 
cussed, 127-8 ; when of no value, 
129 ; when serviceable, 288-9. 

Country schools, opportunity for 
growth in, 273. 

Course of study, arrangement of, left 
to school, 106 ; as opportunity for 
constructive thinking, 107 ; its es- 
sential nature, 287 ; relation of, to 
socialization, 106 ; significance of, 
104-6 ; ultimate reason for, 107. 



INDEX 



319 



Criticism, character of helpful, 273. 

Culture, as related to knowledge and 
character, 61 ; defined, 60 ; efforts 
to establish an aristocracy of, 61 ; 

„ not wholly egoistic, 49. 

Curiosity, relation of, to causal 
thinking, 171-2. 

Curriculum, changes in, due to what, 
52 ; of elementary school, a social 
thing, 51-2. 

Deaf-blind girl, not teachable, 75. 

Deaf-mutes, symbolism in education 
of, 29. 

Debt, of each person, to society, 285 ; 
of civilization, to each child, 284. 

Decoration, pupils should participate 
in, 112 ; should be dynamic, 112. 

Definite, not same as indirect, 157-9. 

Definition, as a form of judgment, 
230 ; as the reverse of concept 
forming, 229. 

Depravity, theory of total, 89-90. 

Developing questions, 157-8. 

Development, relation of manners to, 
214-5 ; two phases of mental, 76. 

Direct question, illustrated and dis- 
cussed, 152-3. 

Discipline, allied to instruction, 86 ; 
as a formative thing, 132 ; best 
kind of, 288 ; conclusions regarding, 
131-3 ; defined, 87 ; fundamental 
aim of, 87-8; fundamental prin- 
ciple of method in, 88 ; introduc- 
tion to problems of, 86-94 ; posi- 
tive, not negative, 87 ; secret of 
successful, 132 ; summary of, 133 ; 
summary of introduction to prob- 
lems of, 93-4 ; why difficult, 87. 

Discovery, accidental, 71 ; as related 
to hypothesis, 72 ; as related to syn- 
thetic judgment, 234-5 ; defined, 71 ; 
limitations of, as a schoolroom 
method, 74 ; planned, 72. 

Distinction, how it arises, 221 ; stage 
of, 98-9; 221-4. 

Division of labor, its demands upon 
elementary education, 53. 

Doing, as giving basal sense of real- 
ity, 81 ; explained, 80-1 ; habitual, 
80 ; outcome of, 133 ; selective, 80. 

Domestic activities, humanizing val- 
ues of, 219. 

Domestication of animals, 218. 

Dramatization, 206-8 ; conscious imi- 
tation in, 206 ; discussed, 206 ; ma- 
terial for, 208-9. 

Drawing, aesthetic element in, 46 ; 
failure of early attempts at, in 
schools, 112 ; social value of, 46. 
Drills, formal, 80. 

Duty, to help life forward, 285 ; of 
teacher, to visit patrons, 117-8 ; 
toward the community, 117. 
Economic independence, stage of, 100 
Economic serviceableness of a knowl 

edge of nature's laws, 50-1. 
Education, a universal concern, 11 



aim of, must be realized in concrete 
processes, 286 ; and natural ten- 
dencies, 35-6 ; and the perpetuity 
of the race, 289 ; as a process, 18 ; 
as a process of grafting, 35-6 ; as 
infolding and unfolding, 280-1 ; as 
othering, 38 ; as removal of ten- 
sion, 39-40 ; as socialization, 40 ; 
as socialization by participation, 
277-8 ; as world-building, 37-8 , 
considered in various ways, 12 ; en- 
gineer's definition of, 11 ; evidence 
of, 11 ; inevitable, 277 ; is both 
physiological and psychological, 34 ; 
first concern of, 76 ; fundamental 
aim of, 86 ; more than brain organ- 
ization, 34-5 ; organizing acquired 
habits and tendencies, 33-5 ; the 
new, defined, 28 ; the old, defined, 
28 ; process of, described, 63 ; when 
at its best, 289. 

Educative efficiency, in relation to 
child's response, 102. 

Educative materials, what the term 
includes, 58. 

Educative motor activity, limits of, 
199. 

Educational ideal, an inclusive and 
pervasive thing, 20 ; as adequate 
participation in social life, 24 ff. ; 
change of, with progress, 20 ; con- 
flict of, 20 ; formulated, 26 ; prog- 
ress in, 24 ; source of, 20. 

Educational values, standard of, 59. 

Effect, relation of, to cause, 169. 

Efficiency of schools, depends on what, 
32. 

Elementary education, its progress, 
31. 

Elementary schools, their relation to 
social consciousness, 31. 

Elliptical questions, 155. 

English grammar, as involving logi- 
cal thinking, 177. 

Estrangement, explained, 39 ; its re- 
moval as related to increase of 
knowledge, 39-40. 

Ethical attitude, stages in develop- 
ment of, 93. 

Ethical code, of the teacher, 14. 

Ethical ideals, slow growth of, 129- 
30. 

Examples, differ from problems, 247. 

Evolution, influence of doctrine of, on 
way of conceiving education, 40. 

Exchange, training in, 220. 

Executive-teacher, 13. 

Experience, educative values of mo- 
tor and reactive, 288 ; involuntary 
forms of, 64-9 ; relation of, to 
learning, 63 ; vicarious character of, 
207-8. 

Experience and reflection, theory of, 
91-2. 

Experiment, as supplementary to ob- 
servation, 77 ; described, 77-9 ; im- 
itative performance of experiment, 



320 



INDEX 



78 ; manuals of, 78 ; may be too 
rapid, 78 ; value of, in human 
progress, 77. 

Expulsion, of pupils, 116. 

Extra-legal relationships of the 
school, 117-9. 

Fancy, discussed, 205-6 ; need of 
stimulation of, 206. 

Farmers' institute, 22-3. 

Fatigue, laws of, 103. 

Flowers, at school, 114. 

Form, relation of, to content, 185 ; 
in teaching, 196 ; why it has pre- 
ceded content in schools, 190-1. 

Formal steps, argument for, 81-2 ; as 
a uniform method of teaching, 81- 
4 ; as related to anschauung, 77 ; 
objections to, 82-4. 

Freedom, value of, in all convention- 
alized activity, 144-5. 

Games, amateurs in, 210 ; conscious 
imitation in, 210 ; educative values 
of, 206-7 ; educative worth of, for- 
mulated, 209-10 ; essential charac- 
ter of, 209 ; formative influence of, 
199-200 ; invention in, 210 ; limita- 
tion of what can be learned 
through, 210 ; physical exercise in, 
211 ; professionals in, 210. 

Gap, between impression and ex- 
pression, 36 ; as related to reflec- 
tion and the rise of voluntary con- 
sciousness, 37. 

Gardening, educative aspects of, 217 ; 
place for, in child's life, 217-8. 

Gardens, school, 113-4. 

Geography, defined, 47-8 ; former and 
present methods of teaching, 193 ; 
industrial element in, 48 ; physio- 
graphic ideal of, 47-8 ; social value 
of, 48 ; what it was originally, 47. 

Goodness, theory of innate, 90. 

Grammar, as distinguished from lan- 
guage, 250 ; defined, 46 ; great end 
to be gained by study of, 179 ; log- 
ical thinking in, 177-8, 249-50; 
relation of, to language, 118 ; so- 
cial values of, 46 ; why so highly 
esteemed in the past, 178. 

Group connections, of an individual, 
19. 

Group instruction, benefits of, 31. 

Groups, unity of, 26. 

Guidance, character of helpful, 272-3. 

Habit, 123 ; as basis for thinking, 
80-1 ; described, 33-4 ; mental, 34 ; 
social, 23-4. 

Habits, of attention, how formed, 
264-5. 

Heating a schoolroom, 103. 

History, as past social adjustment, 
48-9 ; value of knowledge of, 49. 

Honesty, intellectual, in teacher, 109- 
10. 

Honor, sense of, 129. 

Human motive, as a cause, 226. 



Hypothesis, as related to discovery, 
72. 

Ideal and real, relation between, 40. 

Ideals, slow growth of ethical, 129- 
30 ; source of, in life of race, 25. 

Ideas, basal ones gained through mo- 
tor activity, 200. 

Ideo-motor action, stage of, 97-8. 

Ideo-motor suggestion, 67. 

Ignorance, as cause of offenses, 122. 

Image, defined, 202. 

Images, as related in causal series, 
224-6 ; clearness of, 226 ; no abso- 
lute line between concepts and, 203 ; 
thinking in typical, 203 ; two kinds 
of, 202. 

Image thinking, sub-stages of, 204-27. 

Imagination, use of, in language, 25. 

Imitation, as a method of learning, 
70 ; as related to synthetic judg- 
ment, 233 ; "bare," or "mere." 70 ; 
conscious, 69-70 ; in experiment, 
78 ; in opinion-making, 238-9 ; of 
complex industrial processes, 221 ; 
of industrial and commercial proc- 
esses, 216-21 ; of local industrial 
processes, 221 ; of political proces- 
ses, 211-14 ; of racial activities, 
217 ; of real and symbolical activ- 
ities, 42 ; of social activities, 211- 
21 ; of things in a loose way, 216 ; 
outcome of, 98 ; outcome of, in the 
child, 70 ; stage of conscious, 98 ; 
unconscious, 97. 

Impulsive action, 65. 

Impulsiveness, 122. 

Impression and reaction, 36. 

Independence, in opinion making, 239. 

Indirect, as opposed to indefinite, 
157-9. 

Indirect question, illustrated and dis- 
cussed, 153-4. 

Induction, and logical thinking, 245. 

Industry, educative value of, 53-4 ; 
social character of, 55 ; social ref- 
erence of, 53 ; relation of, to men- 
tal power and versatility, 54 ; value 
of acquaintance with typical forms 
of, 53 ; value of broad acquaint- 
ance with, 54. 

Inefficiency, doom of, in schools, 275. 

Infancy, period of, lengthens with 
progress, 278. 

Influence of the teacher, 108. 

Inheritance, re-creation of racial, 
282-3, Chap. V, on Method. 

Inhibition, and the rise of self-con- 
trol, 37 ; applicability of, by sub- 
stitution, 125-6 ; as opposed to ap- 
perception, 37 ; by negation, de- 
fined, 124 ; by negation and by sub- 
stitution, 124-6 ; by substitution, 
defined and illustrated, 124-5 ; de- 
fined, 37 ; physiological meaning of, 
124 ; psychological meaning of, 124. 

Initiative, as a stage of socialization, 
42 ; based on previous attainment, 



INDEX 



321 



42 ; educative effect of, 264 ; fun- 
damental duty of, 42-3 ; relation 
of, to development of will, 133. 

In loco parentis, two implications of, 
115-6. 

Insight, defined, 13 ; influence of, on 
teacher, 275 ; needful to successful 
teaching, 13 ; of teacher, 109. 

Instinctive action, 65-6. 

Instinctive movements, 96. 

Instincts, as transitory, 97. 

Institutions, educative character of, 
52-3 ; defined, 29 ; participation in, 
a necessity, 53 ; relation of, to so- 
cialization, 29 ; social nature of, 29. 

Interest, and attention, 253-67 ; and 
efforts to learn, 255 ; and habit, 
255 ; as related to order of course 
of study, 106-7 ; as result of ad- 
justment, 254 ; defined, 287 ; defined 
and illustrated, 253-4 ; double rela- 
tion of, to repetition, 254 ; law of 
spreading, 107 ; natural and ac- 
quired, 254 ; of class depends on 
various things, 259-61 ; participa- 
tion as related to permanent lines 
of, 266 ; permanent lines of, 266 ; 
place of, in the formation of habits 
of attention, 264 ; relation of, to 
self-activity, 260 ; unity of, and 
attention, 257 ; value of permanent, 
266. 

Interpretation of symbols, experience 
broadened by, 42 ; stage of social- 
ization through, 42. 

Interpretative psychology, value of, 
15. 

Invention, defined, 74, 221 ; discour- 
aged by some teachers, 222 ; how 
stimulated, 223 ; in arithmetic, 
223 ; in study of history, 223 ; 
stage of, 221-4; synthesis in, «74. 

Judgment, defined, 230 ; definition of 
analytic, 230 ; definition of syn- 
thetic, 230 ; pedagogy of synthetic, 
233-9. 

Kinds of thinking, as related to ques- 
tions, 162-79. 

Knowledge, analyzed and defined, 59 ; 
as effecting organization of self, 
59 ; as related to character and cul- 
ture, 61 ; as transient and perma- 
nent, 59 ; genetic relation of, to mo- 
tor activity, 145-6 ; stages of, 201- 
52 ; value of, of psychology, to the 
teacher, 14 ; values of use of, 59 ; 
what makes for permanent control 
of, 59. 

Labor, distinction between skilled and 
unskilled, 80. 

Lange-James theory of emotion, 125- 
6, 214. 

Language, a social product, 44-6 ; an 
inclusive term, 44-6 ; as coordi- 
nated movement, 25 ; as distinct 
from grammar, 250 ; conventional 
character of, 45 ; function of im- 



agination in, 25 ; oral, as unmean- 
ing sound, 45 ; passive interpreta- 
tion and constructive use of, 44-5 ; 
relation of, to grammar, 178 ; rela- 
tion of, to motor experience, 25 ; 
socializing aspect of, 25 ; why 
control of, is valuable, 25 ; written, 
as unmeaning marks, 45. 

Languages, former value of classic, 
144. 

Law, of nervous reaction, 36. 

Laws, ethical, 56-7 ; institutional, 56 ; 
nature of mathematical and scien- 
tific, 203; spiritual, 57. 

Laziness, 123. 

Leading question, illustrated, 154-5 ; 
why not valuable, 154-5. 

Learning, as limited by natural ten- 
dencies, 36 ; as related to natural 
tendencies, 35-6 ; ways of, sum- 
marized, 85. 

Legal relationships of the school, 
115-7. 

Life of race, ideal elements in, 25 ; 
participation in, 41-3, 52-8, 85, 
143, 252, 282-4. 

Lighting, 103. 

Literature, described in social terms, 
49 ; its relation to life, 49. 

Logical thinking, 242-52 ; and sys- 
tematization, 250-1 ; as related to 
perception and judgment, 174-5 ; 
defined, 243 ; described, 173 ; dia- 
gram representing necessary rela- 
tions of, 243 ; explicit development 
of, 244-5 ; illustrated, 243-4 ; in 
arithmetic, 246-7 ; in English gram- 
mar, 249-50 ; not vicarious, 248. 

Logic of life, an outcome of logical 
thinking, 251. 

Loyalty, stage of, 100-1. 

Make-believe, discussed, 205-6. 

Management, defined, 102. 

Manners, acquired by imitation, 215 ; 
dangers of teaching, by imitation, 
216 ; degenerate under excitement, 
215 ; easily taught, 215 ; formative 
as well as revealing, 213. 

Manual training, and useful things, 
219. 

Map-drawing, used as an aid in 
purely locative geography, 47. 

Maps, value of, 47. 

Materials for decoration, 114. 

Meaning of education, found in con- 
crete processes, 33. 

Meanness, defined, 123. 

Mechanical, phases of organization, 
102-4 ; place of, in education, 280. 

Meetings of patrons, 119. 

Memory work, effect of, on causal 
thinking, 170-1. 

Mental activities, character of, 18 ; 
relation between character and se- 
quence of, 18 ; sequence of, 18. 

Mental activity, and method, 281-2 ; 
classified in various ways, 281-2. 



322 



INDEX 



Mental construction, and reality, 38 ; 
as dependent upon objective things, 
38. 

Method, analyzed in various ways, 
260 ; as correlative with ways of 
learning, 84-5 ; based on the way 
in which the mind learns, 63 ; de- 
fined, 63-85 ; of learning, 279-80. 

Methods of teaching, correlative with 
ways of learning, 260-1. 

Mind, more than stimuli, 69. 

Motive, and its manifestation in chil- 
dren, 226 ; defined, 123 ; of teacher, 
276. 

Motor activity, limit of educative, 
199 ; should be used for its for- 
mative influence, 198. 

Motor attitude, formative influence of, 
186-7. 

Motor children, 99, 145. 

Motor control, of natural things, 27 ; 
primacy of, 27 ; relation to life, 27. 

Motor type of child, 99, 145. 

Movement, the, in primary education, 
42. 

Movements, instinctive, 96 ; reflex, 
95 ; sensory, 95-6 ; spontaneous, 64, 
94-5. 

Name-getting, discussed, 204-5. 

Natural endowment, 64. 

Natural laws, necessity of adaptation 
to, 56. 

Nature, formerly neglected by the 
schools, 50. 

Nature study, may lead away from 
life, 51 ; three reasons urged for, 
50. 

Necessary relations, in logical think- 
ing, 243. 

Necessary truth, in logical relation- 
ships, 173-5 ; revealed by logical 
thinking, 174. 

Needs, interest as related to organic, 
254. 

Normal school, function of, 274-5. 

Number facts, value of, 176. 

Object lessons, degenerate form of ob- 
servation, 77. 

Observation, analyzed, 76-7. 

Occupations, values of, in schools, 
26-7. 

Offenses, how deal with, when arising 
from certain causes, 122-3 ; preva- 
lent ones in schools, 121-2 ; sources 
of, 122. 

Opinion-making, and conduct, 239 ; 
teacher's function with respect to, 
239. 

Oral teaching, essentials of good, 159- 
60. 

Order, defined, 119. 

Organic aspects of subjects, 286-7. 

Organization, defined, 102 ; of self 
without attention, 258. 

Original work, two meanings of, 78 ; 
values of, 78-9. 



Originality, defined, 221 ; relation of, 
to sense of power, 221-2. 

Othering, 12 ; in two directions, 38. 

Pain, as connected with inhibition, 
127 ; as connected with reflection, 
127; value of, 126. 

Parallelism, between racial and de- 
veloping child's ideals, 41 ; of men- 
tal and brain development, 35. 

Parsing, why it was enjoyed, 250. 

Participation, as dependent upon re- 
active behavior, 144 ; as related to 
discovery and invention, 264 ; as 
related to motor activity, 264 ; de- 
fined, 263 ; how possible, 26 ff. ; 
how things may be taught so that 
there is no, 263-4 ; in actual and 
ideal ways, 40 ; in social life, de- 
pendent on control of symbolism, 
28 ; of pupils, in government of tljfc 
school, 213 ; outcome of, 133 ; rela- 
tion of cooperation to, 213-4. 

Passive impressions, 113. 

Patrons, duty of, to visit and sup- 
port school, 118 ; meetings of, 119. 

Pedagogy, as a series of problems, 
16; "commanded," 16. 

"Pedagogical applications," in books 
for teachers, 16. 

Pedagogical blunder of all ages, 61. 

Personality of teacher, a factor in 
class attention, 263 ; a factor in 
class interest, 261 ; wholesome, is 
first requisite, 263. 

Personal attitudes, formation of, 239- 
42. 

Pestalozzi's doctrine of anschauung, 
76-7. 

Pests, extermination of, 218. 

Fhilosophy of life, teacher should 
have a wholesome, 269 ; teacher's 
duty with respect to pupils' ten- 
dency to form a, 251 ; the tendency 
to form one, 251. 

Physiological suggestion, 66. 

Pivotal questions, 159 ; wandering as 
related to, 159. 

Planned discovery, why educative, 
72-3. 

Playground, educative aspect of, 210. 

Politeness, relation of, to effective- 
ness of the teacher, 150. 

Political action, related to social life, 
211. 

Political processes, imitation of, 211- 
14. 

Practical things, usually lacking in 
culture, 60. 

Preparation, of the teacher, 268-76. 

Private and technical schools, wiiere 
they exist and why organized, 30-1. 

Problem, essential nature of, 183, 
285 ; medley solution of school, 13 ; 
of school, 12 ; solution of an arith- 
metical, 175-6 ; value of the, to 
teaching, 285. 

Problems, as different from number 



INDEX 



323 



facts, 176 ; nature of arithmetical, 
175 ; logical thinking in solution 
of, 246-7. 

Processes, imitation of political, 211- 
4. 

Program, making of a, 103-4. 

Progress, in educational ideal, 24. 

Psychology, value of books on, 14 ; 
value of genetic, 272. 

Public schools, as expressive of so- 
cial consciousness, 31 ; scope of, 31. 

Punishment, a small part of disci- 
pline, 132 ; by appeals to sense of 
honor, 128-9 ; by loss of social po- 
sition, 128-9 ; by saturation, 131 ; 
by use of subject matter, 130 : cor- 
poral, discussed, 127-8 ; kinds of. 
discussed, 127-31 ; kinds of, listed, 
127 ; meaning of, 126. 

Pupils, care of yard by, 113; how 
they should study assignments, 182. 

Purpose of this book, 16-7. 

Purposed discovery, 72. 

Puzzles, tentative hypothesis in solu- 
tion of, 75. 

Quantitative control, when of inter- 
est, 241. 

Question, alternative, 155 ; clarify- 
ing, discussed and illustrated, 160- 
1 ; defense of direct, invalid, 153 ; 
elliptical, 155 ; form of testing, 
157 ; fundamental purpose of, 151 ; 
illustration of leading, 154-5 ; in- 
direct, discussed and illustrated, 
153-4 ; nature and kinds of, 151- 
79 ; objection to catechetical, 154 ; 
outline of kinds of, 152 ; sign- 
board, 161 ; textbook, 154 ; value 
of, to teacher, 151. 

Questioning, highest phase of art of, 
183. 

Questions, as related to kinds of 
thinking required to answer them, 
162-79; developing, 157-8; final 
statement of worth of, 179 ; illus- 
trations of direct, 152 ; low value 
of direct, 153 ; nature of pivotal, 
286; on basis of form, 152-6; on 
basis of teacher's purpose, 156-62 : 
pivotal, 159 ; various ways of con- 
sidering, 151-2. 

Racial inheritance, re-creation of, 
282-3. 

Random, reflex, sensory, and instinc- 
tive stage of development, 94-7. 

Reaction, double function of, 139-40 ; 
low value of verbal, 142 ; place of 
verbal, 144 ; relation of, to impres- 
sion, 139 ; relation of, to character, 
140-1. 

Reactive behavior, as a stage of so- 
cialization, 41 ; formative value of, 
142 ; forms of, 141 ; how teacher 
may stimulate, 146-7 ; relation of, 
to complex arts and industrial 
processes, 143-4 ; relation of, to 
formation of mental life, 146. 



Reading, as related to synthetic judg- 
ment, 234 ; defined, 45 ; explana- 
tion of alphabet method of teach- 
ing, 191 ; how realism has influ- 
enced method of teaching, 191-2 ; 
phonic method of teaching, 192 ; 
recent methods of teaching, 192-3 ; 
relation of desire for, to growth of 
power in, 193 ; social value of, 45 ; 
word method of teaching, 191-2. 

Real and ideal, relation of, 40. 

Realism, how it has influenced meth- 
ods of teaching, 191-3 ; meaning 
of, 184. 

Realities, are educative, 58. 

Recapitulation, theory of, 91. 

Reception and reaction, relation of, 
139. 

Recitation, literal meaning of, 134 ; 
relation of, to study already done, 
182-3 ; what it was in former 
days, 134. 

Records, importance of keeping, 117. 

Re-creation, of racial inheritance, 61, 
282-3, 76. 

Reflection, a mode of attention, 256-7 ; 
and experience, theory of, 91-2 ; 
one function of, 133 ; related to 
reticence, 257 ; various meanings 
of, 79. 

Reflex movements, 95. 

Reformatory education, based on 
what, 40. 

Religion, reflex influence of, on other 
things, 57. 

Reparation, as a punishment, 130 ; 
defined, 130 ; qualifications as to 
use of, 130-1. 

Repetition, a kind of teaching, 140 : 
as seen in recitation, 134 ; in for- 
mation of habits of attention, 265 ; 
place of, in schools of to-day, 135 ; 
relation of, in graded and un- 
graded schools, 135 ; when valuable, 
140. 

Request, nature of polite, 149 ; value 
of polite, 149. 

Saturation, as a form of punishment, 
131 ; defined, 131 ; value of, as a 
means of punishment, 131. 

School, is the state to the child, 212 ; 
its fundamental problem, 12 ; med- 
ley solution of problems of the, 13 ; 
system, implies a social aim, 12 ; 
twofold function of the, 75 ; what 
its scope should be, 283-4. 

Schoolmaster, 13. 

Schools, as auxiliaries of society, 31 ; 
economy of instruction made pos- 
sible by, 30 ; efficiency of, depends 
on what, 32 ; organization of, a so- 
cial function, 30 ; private, why or- 
ganized, 30-1 ; scope of, is enlarg- 
ing, 32 ; things most readily taught 
in, 30 ; ultimate motive for found- 
ing of, 30 ; value of military, 186-7. 

Schools of education, 275. 



324 



INDEX 



Science, as developing from the arts, 
54-5 ; nature of, 54 ; one should 
reconstruct it, 55 ; reconstruction 
of, by pupils, 232. 

Scientific thinking, in nature study, 
50-1 ; may be unrelated to man, 51. 

Scope of the school, what it should 
be, 283-4. 

Seating of pupils, 102-3. 

Self, defined, 34 ; how it grows, 279- 
80. 

Self-activity, defined, 75 ; not causa 
sui, 279. 

Self-control, of teacher, 108. 

Self-determination, discussed, 132. 

Selfishness, defined, 123. 

Selfhood, sense of, as related to 
achievement, 181 ; stages of, in de- 
veloping children, 94-101. 

Self-reliance, how built up, 224. 

Self-satisfied stage, 99. 

Self-support, a social duty, 58. 

Sense of honor, appeals to, 129. 

Sense of life, how it arises, 283. 

Sense of need, teacher's duty toward, 
287. 

Sensori-motor suggestion, 66-7. 

Sensory, action, 65 ; children, 99 ; 
movements, 95-6 ; type of child, 
145. 

Shallowness, origin of, 284. 

Shelter, necessity of, 219. 

Sign-board question, 161. 

Similarity, as related to causal think- 
ing, 167-8, 229 ; how comparison 
requires thinking by, 167 ; how 
preparation may stimulate think- 
ing by, 166 ; how questions may 
arouse thinking by, 167 ; relation 
of, to contiguity, 166 ; thinking by, 
165-6. 

Sincerity of the teacher, 118. 

Skill, in teaching, of slow growth, 272. 

Social behavior, conventional forms 
of, 214-6. 

Social efficiency, the real reason for 
language training is, 45-6. 

Social feeling, how it becomes defi- 
nite, 23. 

Social habit, 23-4 ; in educational 
matters, 24. 

Social ideal, origin of, 19. 

Social life, gives meaning to all in- 
ventions, 43 ; actual and ideal as- 
pects of, 24 ff. 

Social position, loss of, as a punish- 
ment, 128-9 ; sense of, defined, 128. 

Social relationship, of a school, 115- 
9. 

Socialization, described, 40 ; how it 
takes place, 41 ; more than knowl- 
edge, 32 ; of actual and ideal 
types, 279 ; stages, or levels of, 
41-42 ; what is meant by it, 32. 

Socializing values of things taught 
in schools, 30. 



Sociology, as influencing the notion 
of education, 40. 

Special teachers, two types of, 274. 

Spelling, defined, 45 ; social value of, 
45. 

Spiritual phases of school organiza- 
tion, 104-14. 

Spontaneous movements, 64. 

Stage, of adolescence, 101 ; of con- 
scious imitation, 98 ; of distinction, 
98-9 ; of economic independence, 
100 ; of ideo-motor action, 97-8 ; 
of loyalty, 100-1. 

Stages, in process of education, 39 ; 
of knowledge, 201-52 ; of knowl- 
edge are not clearly separated, 
226-7 ; of knowledge, defined, 201 ; 
of knowledge, outlined, 202 ; of po- 
litical action, 212 ; of thinking, in 
images and concepts, 202. 

Stimulus, relation of, to mental 
changes, 146. 

Structure of nervous system, modi- 
fied by adjustment, 34. 

Studies, prescribed, 116. 

Study, of assignments by pupils, 182 ; 
relation of recitation to, already 
performed, 182-3 ; subjects in 
course of, 105. 

Subject matter, as a punishment, 130. 

Subjects, found in the elementary 
.school, 44, 105 ; reasons for teach- 
ing those in course of study, 105- 
6 ; the social reference of school, 
44-52. 

Suggestion, ideo-motor, 67 ; nature ot. 
50 ; physiological, 66 ; sensori- 
motor, 66-7 ; value of, 150. 

Summary, of discipline, 133 ; of how 
participation is possible. 29 ; of 
introduction to problems of discip- 
line, 93-4 ; of relation between 
consciousness and motor activity, 
187 ; of social relations of educa- 
tional ideal, 20-1 ; of stages of 
knowledge, of knowledge and stages 
of instruction, 251-2 ; of the out- 
come of imitation, 221 ; of value of 
concepts to mental development, 
233 ; on questions on basis of 
teacher's purpose, 162 ; on rela- 
tion of attention to formation of 
self, 259 ; on the formative in- 
fluence of motor activity, 197-200 ; 
on topic of questions, 179 ; on 
value of questions, 156. 

Supplies, purchase of, 116. 

Suspended judgment, as related to 
causal thinking, 172. 

Suspension of pupils, 116. 

Symbolism, meaning of, 184 ; rela- 
tion of, to thought, 28. 

Symbols, as a test of thought, 195 ; 
as effective and rapid means of 
conveying ideas, 193-4 ; as related 
to valid ideas, 195-6 ; as supple- 
mented by gesture, 194 ; function 



INDEX. 325 

of, 76 ; illustration of use of, by persons and things, 136-7 ; of per- 

children, 188-9 ; interpretation of, sons with designs, 137-8 ; relation 

42 ; meaning of conventionalized, of causal connection to effective, 

190 ; motor meanings of, 188 ; nat- 172 ; relation of, to reactive be- 

ure of, 187-8 ; only one phase of havior, 138-46 ; test of, 136, 137, 

every subject, 196 ; place of, in 138 ; what it is, 135-8. 

elementary education, 142 ; reflex Technical courses, in secondary 

influence of use of, 195 ; relation schools, 31. 

of, to geography, 193 ; render ideas Technical skill, gained in private 

definite, 194 ; values of convention- schools, 31. 

alized, 190, 193-5 ; varying degrees Tendencies to behavior, how they 

of validity of, 190. arise, 34. 

Sympathy, basis of, 143-4. Tendency, mental, 34. 

Synthesis, defined, 69 ; in discovery, Tension, removal of 4 12. 

71; in invention, 74. Testing question, 154. 

Synthetic judgment, as hindered by Textbook questions illustrated, 154. 

formal memory work, 239 ; as re- Thinking, causal, 239-42 ; causal, 

lated to discovery, 234-5 ; as relat- described, 167-73 ; constructive, 

ed to the making of opinions, 23S ; 183 ; kinds of, as related to ques- 

defined, 230 ; fostered by attitude tions, 162-79 ; logical, described 

of teacher, 238 ; fostered by con- and analyzed, 173-9, 242-52 ; nat- 

tinuity of attention, 237 ; fostered ural, explained, 163-7. 

by discovery and invention, 236 ; Tilling the soil, 217-8. 

fostered by use of comparison, 237 ; Topics, order of, is variable, 287. 

hindered by neglect of appercep- Types, sensory and motor, 145. 

tion, 236 ; hindered by overwilling Uniformity of nature, principle of, 

teacher, 236 ; pedagogy of, 233-9. 245. 

Teacher, and service, 276 ; as ar- Units, of study, 286-7. 

tist, 13 ; as executive, 13 : con- Utility, of beauty, 220 ; results of 

scious influence of, 108 ; need of failure to satisfy sense of, 100. 

consistency in the, 110 ; needs in- Variety, necessity of, 265. 

sight, 109 ; needs intellectual hon- Ventilation, 103. 

esty, 109-10 ; personal influence of Verbal reaction, low value of, 142. 

the, 107-10 ; qualities of a sue- Verbal repetition, not knowledge, 14. 

cessful, 119 ; self-control necessary Verbalism, defined, 196-7. 

to, 108 ; should know the history Village schools, opportunity for 

of society, 268-9, the ideal ten- growth in, 273-4. 

dencies of society, 270, present so- Vividness, relation of, to amount of 

ciety, 269, the physical, intellectual, repetition necessary, 265. 

emotional, and volitional develop- Voice, educative value of human, 147. 

ment of the child, 270-2 ; sympathy Voluntary act, analyzed, 39. 

of, 108-9 ; unconscious influence of, Wandering, causes of, 159. 

108. Weaving, opportunities for invention 

Teaching, as a massing of stimuli, in, 218-9 ; values of, 218-9. 

138 ; as related to common sense, Wonder, discussed, 204-5. 

160; central problem of, 183; cor- Words, how acquired, 229; what 

relative with learning, 138 ; de- they name, 229. 

fined, 135-8 ; essentials of success- Work, assignment of, 179-82. 

ful oral, 159-60 ; implies much World-building, 12. 

more than what is taught, 268 ; Writing, defined 45 ; social value of, 

of nature, illustrated, 135-6; of 45. 



*W 17 ?905 



